Lin Biao

Youth uniform, 1944|200px Lin Biao was the son of a prosperous merchant family in Huanggang, Hubei. His name at birth was "Lin Yurong". and moved to Shanghai in 1919 to continue his education. As a child, Lin was much more interested in participating in student movements than in pursuing his formal education. Lin transferred to Wuchang Gongjin High School () at 15. Lin joined a satellite organization of the Communist Youth League before he graduated high school in 1925. Later in 1925 he participated in the May Thirtieth Movement and enrolled in the newly established Whampoa (Huangpu) Military Academy in Guangzhou. Lin's relationship with Zhou was never especially close, but they rarely opposed each other directly. During the campaign Lin worked as a company commander under a regiment led by Chen Yi. Following the failure of the revolt, Lin escaped to the remote Communist base areas, and joined Mao Zedong and Zhu De in the Jiangxi–Fujian Soviet in 1928. After joining forces with Mao, Lin became one of Mao's closest supporters. Within the Jiangxi Soviet, Lin's First Army Group was the best-equipped and arguably most successful force within the Red Army. Lin's First Army became known for its mobility, and for its ability to execute successful flanking maneuvers. Between 1930 and 1933, Lin's forces captured twice the number of prisoners of war and military equipment as the Third and Fifth Army Groups combined. The successes of Lin's forces are due partially to the division of labour within the Red Army: Lin's forces were more offensive and unorthodox than other groups, allowing Lin to capitalize on other Red Army commanders' successes. During the Communists' defense against Chiang's 1933–34 Fifth Encirclement Campaign, Lin advocated a strategy of protracted guerilla warfare, and opposed the positional warfare advocated by Braun and his supporters. Lin believed that the best way to destroy enemy soldiers was not to pursue them or defend strategic points, but to weaken the enemy through feints, ambushes, encirclements, and surprise attacks. Lin's views generally conformed with the tactics advocated by Mao. After Chiang's forces successfully occupied several strategic locations within the Jiangxi Soviet, in 1934, Lin was one of the first Red Army commanders to publicly advocate the abandonment of the Jiangxi Soviet, but he was opposed by most Red Army commanders, especially Braun and Peng Dehuai. After the Communists finally resolved to abandon their base, later in 1934, Lin continued his position as one of the most successful commanders in the Red Army during the Long March. Under the direction of Mao and Zhou, the Red Army finally arrived at the remote Communist base of Yan'an, Shaanxi, in December 1936. Lin and Peng Dehuai were generally considered the Red Army's best battlefield commanders, The American journalist Edgar Snow met Lin Biao in the Communist base of Shaanxi in 1936, and wrote about Lin in his book, Red Star Over China. Snow's account focused more on the role of Peng than Lin, evidently having had long conversations with, and devoting two whole chapters to, Peng (more than any other individual apart from Mao). Though he said of Lin: Lin Biao did not present the bluff, lusty face of Peng Dehuai. He was ten years younger, rather slight, oval-faced, dark, handsome. Peng talked with his men. Lin kept his distance. To many he seemed shy and reserved. There are no stories reflecting warmth and affection for his men. His fellow Red Army commanders respected Lin, but when he spoke, it was all business... The contrast between Mao's top field commanders could hardly have been more sharp, but on the Long March they worked well together, Lin specializing in feints, masked strategy, surprises, ambushes, flank attacks, pounces from the rear, and stratagems. Peng met the enemy head-on in frontal assaults and fought with such fury that again and again he wiped them out. Peng did not believe a battle well fought unless he managed to replenish—and more than replenish—any losses by seizure of enemy guns and converting prisoners of war to new and loyal recruits to the Red Army. With Mao Zedong, Lin Biao shared the distinction of being one of the few Red commanders never wounded. Engaged on the front in more than a hundred battles, in field command for more than 10 years, exposed to every hardship that his men have known, with a reward of $100,000 on his head, he miraculously remained unhurt and in good health. In 1932, Lin Biao was given command of the 1st Red Army Corps, which then numbered about 20,000 rifles. It became the most dreaded section of the Red Army. Chiefly due to Lin's extraordinary talent as a tactician, it destroyed, defeated or outmanoeuvered every Government force sent against it and was never broken in battle.... Like many able Red commanders, Lin has never been outside China, speaks and reads no language but Chinese. Before the age of 30, however, he has already won recognition beyond Red circles. His articles in the Chinese Reds' military magazines... have been republished, studied and criticised in Nanking (Nanjing) military journals, and also in Japan and Soviet Russia. Within a year of Snow's reporting, Lin was seriously wounded. A Red Army soldier shot him by mistake. but some accounts claim that Lin sometimes made disparaging comments about Mao in private, and that Lin's support of Mao was largely for the pursuit of power. After arriving in Yan'an, Lin became the principal of the newly founded Chinese People's Anti-Japanese Military and Political University. In 1937, Lin married one of the students there, a girl named Liu Ximin, who had earned the nickname "University Flower". Chinese-Japanese War (1931–1945) and their children In August 1937, Lin was named commander-in-chief of the 115th Division of the Communist 8th Route Army The bullet grazed Lin's head, penetrating deep enough to leave a permanent impression on his skull. After being shot in the head, Lin fell from his horse and injured his back. Before returning to China, in 1942, Lin proposed to Sun and promised to divorce his wife, from whom Lin had become estranged. Sun was not able to accept Lin's proposal, but promised to consider marrying Lin after completing her studies. Lin divorced Liu Ximin after returning to China, and married another woman, Ye Qun, in 1943. The relationship between Sun and Ye was notably bad. After returning to Yan'an, Lin was involved in troop training and indoctrination assignments. Liaoshen Campaign Lin was absent for most of the fighting during World War II, but was elected the sixth-ranking Central Committee member in 1945 based on his earlier battlefield reputation. By the end of 1945, Lin had 280,000 troops in Manchuria under his command, but according to Kuomintang estimates only 100,000 of these were regular forces with access to adequate equipment. The KMT also estimated that Lin also had access to 100,000 irregular auxiliaries, whose membership was drawn mainly from unemployed factory workers. Lin avoided decisive confrontations throughout 1945, and he was able to preserve the strength of his army despite criticism from his peers in the Party and the PLA. For the sake of bargaining with the Kuomintang in peace negotiations in 1946, Mao ordered Lin to assemble his army to take and defend key cities, which was against the previous strategy of the Red Army. Lin disagreed with this position, but was ordered by Mao to draw the KMT into a decisive battle and "not give an inch of land" around Siping, Jilin. On 15 April, Lin orchestrated an ambush and forced KMT forces there to withdraw with heavy casualties. When the local KMT commander, Du Yuming, launched a counterattack on 18 April, Mao ordered the troops there to hold the city indefinitely. The fighting continued until Mao finally allowed Lin to withdraw on 19 May, which Lin did immediately, barely saving his army from encirclement and destruction. Du pursued Lin's forces to the south bank of the Songhua River, where they halted due to Du's concerns about his army becoming overextended. According to Communist sources, Lin's army lost 15,000 soldiers in the fighting and withdrawal, but Nationalist sources claim that 25,000 soldiers also deserted or surrendered, and that Lin's force of 100,000 irregular auxiliaries suffered from mass desertion during the retreat. On 10 June, the two forces agreed to a ceasefire brokered by George Marshall, and fighting temporarily ceased. Mao ordered Lin to counterattack that winter, but Lin refused, replying that his forces were exhausted and not logistically prepared to do so. When Du led the majority of his forces to attack Communist forces on the Korean border in January 1947, Lin finally ordered 20,000 of his soldiers to cross the Songhua River, where they staged guerrilla raids, ambushed relief forces, attacked isolated garrisons, and avoided decisive confrontations with strong units Du sent to defeat them. While they did so, they looted large quantities of supplies and destroyed the infrastructure of the KMT-held territories that they passed through, including bridges, railroads, fortifications, electrical lines, and boats. When Du sent his forces back south, they were ambushed and defeated. When Du requested reinforcements from Chiang Kai-shek, his request was rejected. On 8 April, Lin moved his headquarters from Harbin to Shuangcheng in order to be closer to the front. On 5 May, he held a conference with his subordinates and announced that his armies would change tactics, engage in a large-scale counterattack, and seek to defeat Du's forces in a decisive battle. On 8 May, Lin launched the first of his "three great campaigns", the Summer Offensive, intending to engage a large garrison at Huaide while a second force positioned itself to ambush the force that would predictably be sent to relieve it. On 17 May, they won a major victory and forced the survivors to retreat to Changchun and Siping. By the end of May 1947, Lin's forces had taken control of most of the countryside (everything except for the rail lines and several major cities), infiltrated and destroyed most KMT forces in Manchuria, and re-established contact with isolated Communist forces in southern Liaoning province. After the victory of the Summer Offensive, Lin's forces gained the initiative and Kuomintang defensive strategy became static and reactionary. Lin ordered his forces to besiege Siping, but they suffered very high casualties and made little progress, partially due to the defenders' strong entrenched position and air support, and due to the attackers' poor artillery support (Lin only had seventy pieces of artillery around Siping). Lin's forces broke into the city twice and engaged in street-to-street fighting, but were driven back both times with heavy casualties. By 19 June, Lin's assault troops had become increasingly exhausted, and Lin began to rotate them to prevent them from becoming completely ineffective. On 24 June, Nationalist reinforcements arrived from the south to lift the siege. Lin recognized that he did not have enough manpower left to defeat them, and on 1 July, he ordered his forces to retreat back to the north of the Songhua River. The Communists suffered over 30,000 losses at Siping, and may have suffered a desertion rate of over 20% during the withdrawal, while the Nationalist garrison at Siping fell from 20,000 to slightly over 3,000 before the siege was broken. Lin volunteered to write a self-criticism after the defeat. He also criticized his commander at Siping, Li Tianyou, for demonstrating poor tactics and for lacking "revolutionary spirit". Despite the army's setbacks he reorganized the army, combining surviving regiments and raising local militia forces to the status of regular units. By the fall of 1947, he had 510,000 soldiers under his command, approximately equal to Nationalist forces in the region. Before Du's replacement, Chen Cheng, could cross north and begin an offensive, Lin moved his army south and began the Autumn Offensive, in which his forces destroyed rail lines and other infrastructure, attacked isolated Nationalist units, and attempted to provoke and ambush strong Nationalist forces. Chen's forces responded to the campaign by withdrawing into their city garrisons. The Communists were not able to provoke a decisive confrontation, and the Autumn Offensive ended in a stalemate. Chen's forces remained static and reactionary, at the end of 1947, Lin led his armies back south in his final Liaoshen Campaign, the Winter Offensive. His initial plan was to repeat the goal of his last offensive, to besiege Jilin City and ambush its relief force, but after reviewing Kuomintang troop dispositions he determined that southern Manchuria would be an easier target. On 15 December, Lin's forces attacked Fakui, Zhangwu, and Xinlitun. Chen sent reinforcements to relieve Fakui, and when the Communist ambush failed, Lin ordered his forces to withdraw and join in the siege of Zhangwu. When Chen did not intervene and the town fell on 28 December, Lin assumed the main part of the campaign was over and he dispersed his forces to rest and attack secondary targets. Chen saw Lin's withdrawal as an opportunity to seize the offensive. He ordered his forces to attack targets in northern Liaoning on 1 January 1948, and on 3 January, Lin successfully encircled the isolated Nationalist 5th Corps. Its commander, Chen Linda, realized that he was being surrounded and requested reinforcements, but Chen Cheng only responded that he would "allow" Chen Linda to withdraw. The attempted breakout failed, and the 5th Corps was destroyed on 7 January. After this defeat, Chen Cheng was replaced with Wei Lihuang ten days later, but Wei was not able to prevent the Communists from capturing Liaoyang on 6 February, destroying the 54th division, and severing an important railroad that linked Wei's forces from their ports on the Bohai Sea. Lin continued his advance, defeating all garrisons in western Manchuria or inducing them to defect by late February. On 26 February Lin reorganized his forces as the Northeastern Field Army and began preparations to return and take Siping, whose garrison had been transferred elsewhere by Chen Cheng and never re-strengthened. Lin began the general assault on the city on 13 March, and took the town one day later. The capture of Siping ended Lin's Winter Offensive. The KMT nearly lost all of Manchuria by the end of the campaign and suffered 156,000 casualties, most of which survived as prisoners of war that were indoctrinated and recruited into Lin's forces. By the end of winter 1948 the Kuomintang had lost all of its territory in the Northeast, except for Changchun, Shenyang, and an area connecting the rail line from Beiping to those cities. Following Lin's Winter campaign, Mao wanted him to attack targets farther south, but Lin disagreed because he did not want to leave a strong enemy at his back, and he believed the defeat of a strong city would force Chiang to abandon the Northeast. By 25 May 1948, the Northeastern Field Army had completely encircled Changchun, including its airfield, and for the rest of the siege the Nationalist commander, Zheng Dongguo, depended entirely on supplies airdropped into the city. On 19 May, Lin submitted a report to Mao in which he expected heavy casualties. By 20 July the siege was at a stalemate, and Lin deferred to Mao, allowing some of his army to attack Jinzhou farther south, beginning the Liaoshen Campaign. When Chiang airlifted reinforcements to defend Jinzhou, Lin ordered his army to abandon the siege and return to Changchun, but Mao disagreed and overruled him, and Lin was ordered to engage the defenders in a decisive confrontation. On 14 October, the Northeast Field Army began its assault on Jinzhou with 250,000 men and the bulk of Lin's artillery and armor. After nearly 24 hours of fighting, Lin's forces were victorious, suffering 24,000 casualties but capturing the enemy commander, Fan Hanjie, and 90,000 enemy soldiers. After hearing the news about the defeat at Jinzhou, a KMT army from Yunnan and its commander, Zeng Zesheng, defected and abandoned its position on the outskirts of Changchun on 14 October. This doomed the remaining Nationalist forces in the city, and Zheng Dongguo was forced to surrender two days later. Chiang ordered the 9th army of 110,000 men under General Liao Yaoxiang to travel west and retake Jinzhou, but Lin directed nearly all of his forces to stop them, and they began to encircle the relief unit on 21 October. After a week of fighting, the Nationalist army was destroyed on 28 October. Remaining KMT garrisons in the Northeast attempted to break out of the region and flee south, but most were unsuccessful. After Changchun, the only major KMT garrison in the Northeast was Shenyang, where 140,000 KMT soldiers were eventually forced to surrender. By the end of 1948 all of Northeast China was under Communist control. Defeating the Kuomintang After taking control of the Manchurian provinces, Lin then swept into North China. Forces under Lin were responsible for winning two of the three major military victories responsible for the defeat of the Kuomintang. Lin suffered from ongoing periods of serious illness throughout the campaign. After taking Beijing, the Communists attempted to negotiate for the surrender of the remaining KMT forces. When these negotiations failed, Lin resumed his attacks on the KMT in the southeast. After taking Beijing, Lin's army numbered 1.5 million soldiers. He crossed the Yangtze River in the Spring of 1949 and decisively defeated the defending KMT army stationed in central China during the Yangtze River Crossing Campaign. Lin's armies continued to defeat KMT armies farther south, finally occupying all KMT positions on mainland China by the end of 1949. The last position occupied by Lin's forces was the tropical island of Hainan. Lin Biao was considered one of the Communists' most brilliant generals after the founding of the People's Republic of China, in 1949. Lin was the youngest of the "Ten Marshals" named in 1955, a title that recognized Lin's substantial military contributions. ==Politician==

Illness Lin Biao continued to have poor health after 1949, and chose to avoid high-profile military and political positions. His status led him to be appointed to a number of high-profile positions throughout most of the 1950s, but these were largely honorary and carried few responsibilities. He generally delegated or neglected many of the formal political responsibilities that he was assigned, usually citing his poor health. His exact medical condition is not well understood, partially because his medical records have never been publicly released. Dr. Li Zhisui, then one of Mao's personal physicians, believed that Lin suffered from neurasthenia and hypochondria. He became ill whenever he perspired, and suffered from phobias about water, wind, cold, Li's account of Lin's condition is notably different from the official Chinese version. In another study, Lin is described as having symptoms similar to those seen in patients of schizoid personality disorder. Lin's personality traits including his aloofness, lack of interest in social relationships, secretiveness, and emotional coldness he exhibited during the Cultural Revolution; indeed, all of these were symptoms very similar to those seen in individuals who have schizoid personality disorder. The challenge of Lin's personality problems in conjunction with the turbulent political climate of the Cultural Revolution impacted his overall ability to govern his position. Lin suffered from excessive headaches, and spent much of his free time consulting Chinese medical texts and preparing traditional Chinese medicines for himself. He suffered from insomnia, and often took sleeping pills. He ate simple meals, did not smoke, and did not drink alcohol. In early October 1950, Peng Dehuai was named commander of the Chinese forces bound for Korea, and Lin went to the Soviet Union for medical treatment. Lin flew to the Soviet Union with Zhou Enlai and participated in negotiations with Joseph Stalin concerning Soviet support for China's intervention, indicating that Mao retained his trust in Lin. Due partially to his periods of ill health and physical rehabilitation in the Soviet Union, Lin was slow to rise to power. In the early 1950s Lin was one of five major leaders given responsibility for civil and military affairs, controlling a jurisdiction in central China. In 1953 he was visited by Gao Gang, and was later suspected of supporting him. In 1955 Lin was named to the Politburo. In 1958 Lin joined the Politburo Standing Committee and became one of China's Vice-chairmen. After the 1959 Lushan Conference, at which Peng criticized Mao's disastrous Great Leap Forward, Peng was arrested and removed from all government positions. and Lin publicly condemned Peng as a "careerist, a conspiracist, and a hypocrite". Under Mao's direction, Peng was disgraced and put under indefinite house arrest. during which Mao's economic policies caused an artificial famine in which tens of millions of people starved to death. For example, Lin publicly defended Mao during the Seven Thousand Cadres Conference in 1962. Lin initially refused to replace Peng, but eventually accepted the position at the insistence of Mao Zedong. As Defense Minister, Lin's command of the PLA was second only to Mao, but he deferred many of his responsibilities to subordinates. The most important figures to whom Lin deferred the day-to-day operations of China's armed forces were Luo Ruiqing, Chief of Staff, and He Long, the Central Military Vice-chairman. Lin's system of indoctrination made it clear the Party was in command of China's armed forces, and Lin ensured that the army's political commissars enjoyed great power and status in order to see that his directives were followed. Lin used his position as Minister of Defense to flatter Mao by promoting Mao's cult of personality. Lin devised and ran a number of national Maoist propaganda campaigns based on the PLA, the most successful of which was the "learn from Lei Feng" campaign, which Lin began in 1963. Because he was the person most responsible for directing the "learn from Lei Feng" campaign, Lin may have directed the forging of ''Lei Feng's Diary'', upon which the propaganda campaign was based. Lin often read speeches prepared by others, and allowed his name to be placed on articles that he did not write, as long as these materials supported Mao. One of the most famous articles published in Lin's name was the 20,000-word pamphlet on revolution in developing countries, ''Long Live the Victory of the People's War!'', which was released in 1965. This article made Lin one of China's leading interpreters of Mao's political theories. The article likened the "emerging forces" of the poor in Asia, Africa, and Latin America to the "rural areas of the world", while the affluent countries of the West were likened to the "cities of the world". Eventually the "cities" would be encircled by revolutions in the "rural areas", following theories prevalent in Mao Zedong Thought. Lin Biao's military reforms and the success of the 1962 Sino-Indian War impressed Mao. A propaganda campaign called "learn from the People's Liberation Army" followed. In 1966, this campaign widened into the Cultural Revolution. == Cultural Revolution ==

, 1966 Rise to prominence Lin's support impressed Mao, who continued to promote Lin to higher political offices. After Mao's second-in-command, President Liu Shaoqi, was denounced as a "capitalist roader" in 1966, Lin Biao emerged as the most likely candidate to replace Liu as Mao's successor. Lin attempted to avoid this promotion, but accepted it on Mao's insistence. In 1966 all other candidates for the position were removed, and Lin accepted the position as sole Vice-chairman, replacing Liu Shaoqi as Mao's unofficial successor. When he was informed that the public's image of Lin was that he was "Mao's best student", Lin was pleased, and stated: "I don't have any talent. What I know, I learned from Mao." Activities '', at Tiananmen, during the Cultural Revolution (1967) Because Lin had no real interest in the position of vice-chairman, he did little other than whatever he believed would ingratiate himself to Mao. Privately, Lin had no interest in promoting the Cultural Revolution, and attended government meetings only when Mao demanded that he do so. Those colleagues closest to Lin noted that Lin avoided talking about the Cultural Revolution in any context other than public speeches, and when pressed would only make very brief and ambiguous statements. After 1966, Lin made no phone calls, received few visitors, secluded himself from his colleagues, and gained a reputation as being "reticent and mysterious". He did not take an active role in government, but allowed his secretaries to read short summaries of selected documents for half an hour in the morning and half an hour in the afternoon. This was generally insufficient to fulfill the responsibilities of vice-chairman, and he left most important work and family duties to his wife, Ye Qun. Lin's passivity was part of a calculated plan to survive the Cultural Revolution alive and well. When Lin perceived that his longtime subordinate, Tao Zhu, was in danger of being purged in the beginning of the Cultural Revolution, Lin sent a letter to warn Tao, advising Tao to be "passive, passive, and passive again". Tao probably did not understand Lin's advice, and was subsequently purged in 1967. Following the lead of Mao, in 1966 Lin directed Red Guards in Beijing to "smash those persons in power who are traveling the capitalist road, the bourgeoisie reactionary authorities, and all royalists of the bourgeoisie, and to forcibly destroy the "four olds": old culture, old ideas, old customs, and old habits. In August 1966 Lin publicly called for a "three-month turmoil" within the PLA, and on October 6 Lin's Central Military Commission issued an urgent instruction that all military academies and institutes were to dismiss their classes and allow their students to become fully involved in the Cultural Revolution. Following the orders of this directive, officers and commissars were expelled from their positions, and some were beaten to death. Students at Chinese military academies followed Lin's instructions to rebel against their senior officers, breaking into the offices of Lin's National Commission for Defense Science to abduct one of the department's directors, and claiming Lin's deputy chief of staff, Li Tianyu, whom students accused of disciplining them. Lin's few proactive attempts to direct the Cultural Revolution were attempts to protect Red Guards and his political allies from political persecution, and to mediate the attempts of Jiang Qing and her followers to radicalize China's political climate. Nicolae Ceaușescu, during Ceaușescu's state visit to China (1971) Lin and Jiang cooperated at the outset of the Cultural Revolution, but their relationship began to deteriorate in 1968 as Jiang frequently attempted to interfere in Chinese military affairs, which Lin found intolerable. By 1970 Lin and Ye were very unfriendly with Jiang Qing: Lin referred to her as a "long-nosed pit viper". Lin Biao, as Defense Minister, was responsible for the Chinese response to the Zhenbao Island incident of March 1969, a battle with the Soviet Union over Damansky Island along the Amur River. Lin issued a report labeling the Soviet Union a "chauvinist" and "social imperialist" power, and issuing orders warning Chinese troops to be wary of an impending Soviet attack. Lin's followers attempted to use the hysteria generated by the incident in an effort to deepen the power that they had gained during the Cultural Revolution, disregarding and acting against the interests of Zhou Enlai and his supporters. Height of power and eventual downfall ''. This is the last known photo of him ever taken (1971). Lin officially became China's second-in-charge in April 1969, following the first plenary session of the 9th Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party. Lin's position as Mao's "closest comrade-in-arms and successor" was recognized when the Party constitution was formally revised to reflect Lin's future succession. At the 9th Central Committee, Lin's faction was unquestionably dominant within the Politburo. Of the Politburo's twenty-one full members, Lin counted on the support of six members: the generals Huang Yongsheng, Wu Faxian, Li Zuopeng, Qiu Huizuo, his wife Ye Qun; and Chen Boda, an ambitious ideologue. Although they were not regarded as part of his faction, Lin would also reliably depend on the support of fellow Marshals Zhu De, Ye Jianying, Liu Bocheng, and Generals Chen Xilian, Xu Shiyou, and most crucially, Wang Dongxing, head of Mao's personal security, due to their combined mutual opposition to Jiang Qing. Lin's support surpassed the number of members aligned with Jiang Qing, and far surpassed those aligned with Zhou Enlai. Because over 45% of the Central Committee were members of the army, Lin's supporters dominated the Politburo, and Lin's power was second only to Mao's. The group of Lin Biao-supporting military leaders known as the "Lin Biao clique" were at the forefront of expanding China's defense capacity. The Lin Biao clique sought to create major industrial complexes in China's hinterlands and therefore strongly supported the Third Front campaign. Because Lin was one of the most influential figures in promoting Mao's personality cult, he began to be criticized within the Party for its excesses later in 1970. A serious rift developed between Mao and Lin. Mao was displeased with comments that Lin had made about his wife, Jiang Qing, at the Lushan Conference. Generals loyal to Lin refused to accept Mao's criticism of them, and Mao began to question whether Lin continued to follow him unconditionally. =="Lin Biao incident" and death==

Lin died when an aircraft carrying him and several members of his family crashed in Mongolia at 2:30 am on 13 September 1971, allegedly after attempting to assassinate Mao and defect to the Soviet Union. Following Lin's death, there has been widespread skepticism in the West concerning the official Chinese explanation, while forensic investigation conducted by the USSR (which recovered the bodies following the crash) has confirmed that Lin was among those who died in the crash. The official narrative from the Chinese government is that Lin Biao had launched a failed coup against Mao, known as "Project 571". In Chinese, "5-7-1" (), is a homophone for "armed uprising" (). Everyone on board, eight men and one woman, were killed. An alternative theory posits that Lin Liguo, who was aware of the increasing hostility expressed towards his father in Mao's speeches, was the originator of the coup plan, which would involve an attack on Mao's train. The Chinese government has no interest in re-evaluating its narrative on Lin Biao's death. Non-Chinese scholars interpreted China's reluctance to consider contradictory evidence of its "official" history as the result of a desire to avoid exploring any issue that may lead to criticism of Mao Zedong or a re-evaluation of the Cultural Revolution in general, which may distract China from pursuing economic growth. A six-month investigation by Western scholars in 1994 examined evidence in Russia, Mongolia, mainland China, the United States, and Taiwan, and came to a number of conclusions, some of which were contrary to the official Chinese version of events. The study confirmed Lin Biao, Ye Qun, and Lin Liguo were all killed in the crash. Lin's aircraft was travelling away from the Soviet Union at the time of its crash, making the exact sequence of events before Lin's death more confusing, and casting doubt on the possibility that Lin was attempting to seek asylum in the USSR. Lin's wife and son may have forced Lin to board the aircraft against his will. Several senior leaders within the Communist Party hierarchy knew Lin and his family would flee, but chose not to attempt to stop their flight. According to this study, Lin had attempted to contact the Kuomintang in Taiwan on two separate occasions shortly before his death. ==Legacy==

, presumably after his death. Lin Biao was survived by Lin Liheng (also known as Doudou) and one other daughter. and within a month of Lin's disappearance over 1,000 senior Chinese military officials were purged. The incident marked the end of the myth within the Party that Mao had always been absolutely correct. In the aftermath of the purge of Lin's supporters, Zhou Enlai replaced Lin as the second most powerful man in China, and Jiang Qing and her followers were never able to displace him. Without the support of Lin, Jiang was unable to prevent Zhou's efforts to improve China's relationship with the United States, or to rehabilitate cadres who had been purged during the Cultural Revolution. The clause in the Party constitution indicating that Lin was Mao's successor was not officially amended until the 10th Central Committee in August 1973. Throughout the 1970s, high-ranking leaders of the Chinese Communist Party, including Hua Guofeng, spread the story to foreign delegates that Lin had conspired with the KGB to assassinate Mao. In 1973 Jiang Qing, Mao's fourth wife and a former political ally of Lin's, started the Criticize Lin, Criticize Confucius campaign, aimed at using Lin's scarred image to attack Zhou Enlai. Much of this propaganda campaign involved the creative falsification of history, including (false) details about how Lin had opposed Mao's leadership and tactics throughout his career. Lin's name became involved in Jiang's propaganda campaign after flashcards, made by Ye Qun to record Lin's thoughts, were discovered in Lin's residence following his death. Some of these flashcards recorded opinions critical of Mao. According to Lin's writings, Mao "will fabricate 'your' opinion first, then he will change 'your' opinion – which is not actually yours, but his fabrication. I should be careful of this standard trick." Another critical comment of Lin's states that Mao "worships himself and has a blind faith in himself. He worships himself to such an extent that all accomplishments are attributed to him, but all mistakes are made by others". Lin's private criticisms of Mao were directly contradictory of the public image cultivated by Lin, who publicly stated following the Great Leap Forward that all mistakes of the past were the result of deviating from Mao's instructions. Like many major proponents of the Cultural Revolution, Lin's image was manipulated after Mao's death in 1976, and many negative aspects of the Cultural Revolution were blamed on Lin. After October 1976, those in power also blamed Mao's supporters, the so-called Gang of Four. In 1980, the Chinese government held a series of "special trials" to identify those most responsible for the Cultural Revolution. In 1981, the government released their verdict: that Lin Biao must be held, along with Jiang Qing, as one of the two major "counter-revolutionary cliques" responsible for the excesses of the late 1960s. Lin has been officially remembered as one of the greatest villains of modern China since then. Lin was never politically rehabilitated, so the charges against him continue to stand. For several decades, Lin's name and image were censored within China, but in recent years a balanced image of Lin has reappeared in popular culture: surviving aides and family members have published memoirs about their experience with Lin; scholars have explored most surviving evidence relevant to his life and death, and have gained exposure within the official Chinese media; movies set before 1949 have made reference to Lin; and Lin's name has re-appeared in Chinese history textbooks, recognizing his contributions to the victory of the Red Army. Within modern China, Lin is regarded as one of the Red Army's best military strategists. In 2007, a big portrait of Lin was added to the Chinese Military Museum in Beijing, included in a display of the "Ten Marshals", a group considered to be the founders of China's armed forces. == See also ==