Many cities and villages in East and South China are experiencing extreme food shortages because of sabotage by the "gang of four," a Hongkong newspaper reported. The independent Ming Pao, quoting recent arrivals from Red China, said the worst hit area is Chekiang province.
American sinologist Roxane Witke's biography of Chiang Ching has exposed to the world that Peiping is like the old intrigue-ridden imperial court. Announcing the publication of excerpts of the biography, Time magazine said life at the top in Red China is ruthless, secretive, unpredictable and dangerous.
Guerrilla bands have mushroomed in areas where Mao Tse-tung and his bandits started their armed rebellion against the Chinese government almost half a century ago, according to intelligence reports reaching Taipei. The bands are active in Kiangsi, where Mao and his fellow Communists proclaimed their "Soviet" system in 1929, and in border areas of Fukien and parts of Kwangtung.
One of Red China's top military commanders may have been slain when he failed to follow Peiping's orders to put down armed supporters of the "gang of four" in the Shanghai-Nanking area when the four were purged last October. Travelers from mainland China, quoting reports circulating widely among lower level Communist party cadres, said Ting Sheng, commander of the Nanking military region, had been shot and killed by another military regional commander, Hsu Shih-yu.
Schools at various levels on the Chinese mainland were under the influence of the "gang of four" to a serious extent, intelligence sources reported in Taipei. Partisans of the "gang of four" counted for as much as 30 per cent of school components at all levels, the sources quoted a Communist cadre as saying.
Peiping appointed Wang Meng as "sports minister" in place of Chuang Tse-tung, who has been accused of links with the "gang of four," according to NCNA.
More than 100 passengers on board a ferryboat were killed last month when it exploded near Swatow, the Hongkong newspaper Ming Pao reported. The paper said the explosion occurred before dawn on February 13 about 200 miles east of Canton.
MARCH 17 - As a result of the chaotic situation in Chekiang, "regular troops" of the Peiping regime have been sent into 18 plants and organizations in the southeast part of the province, according to Radio Chekiang.
Peiping's leaders have called for "resolute suppression" of those causing troubles connected with the mainland railway network. The call was made following a national conference on security and public order on railways.
Five months after the purge of the "gang of four" headed by Chiang Ching, Hua Kuo-feng apparently is being confronted by strong opposition in Liaoning province, where Mao's nephew, Mao Yuan-hsin, was a top leader. Big character posters seen in the provincial capital of Shenyang said that three meetings of the Politburo headed by Hua were held last month to solve the problem of Liaoning, part of the northeastern area formerly called Manchuria.
MARCH 18 - Hua Kuo-feng has told Chiang Ching to account for the deaths of two officials and an army commander, according to Ming Pao of Hongkong. The three were the provincial chief of Yunnan in 1970, Tan Pu-jen; a former "public security minister," Li Chen; and the commander of the Foochow military region, Pi Ting-chun.
People arrested as "counterrevolutionaries" for rioting in Tienanmen Square on April 5 last year have been freed, according to big character posters in Peiping.
Defense industries in the mainland's southwestern province of Yunnan were sabotaged last year, Radio Kunming reported.
The mounting toll of recent executions in Red China jumped sharply with reports of 26 people sentenced to death in Shanghai and three shot for espionage in Canton, Nigel Wade of the London Daily Telegraph reported from Peiping.
MARCH 19 - A Hongkong dispatch of the Toronto Star reported that the Peiping regime has executed 47 persons this month, including 10 accused of political crimes and anti-Communist activities.
Anti-Hua Kuo-feng sentiment is increasing on the Chinese mainland. Radio Fukien said propaganda teams sent by Peiping to rural areas of the province had met resistance from the people or been treated with apathy.
MARCH 20 - Red China's economic performance last year was the worst since the "cultural revolution" a decade ago, Fox Butterfield reported from Hongkong in the New York Times. "Analysts calculate that industrial output increased only 3 to 5 per cent last year, compared with 10 per cent in 1975 and an average of nearly 10 per cent over the last 15 years," Butterfield said. "Agricultural production may have risen only one or two percentage points, less than the increase in population."
Red China has been hit this spring by the most severe drought since 1949, Radio Peiping reported.
MARCH 21- Red China's "state council" called for "immediate" emergency measures to fight the drought. Seriously threatened were 10 million acres of winter wheat in the four largest wheat-producing provinces.
Authorities in Red China's troubled Fukien province have executed at least 18 Communist party cadres who supported the "gang of four," a Hongkong newspaper reported.
MARCH 22 - Political purges are still going on in Red China long after ouster of the "gang of four." Hangchow wall posters accused several high-ranking officials of Chekiang province south of Shanghai of complicity with Chiang Ching.
Red Chinese provincial radio stations disclosed that millions of people have been mobilized to fight the drought. Special "general commands" have been set up to direct field squads.
More than two years before her downfall, Mao Tse-tung's wife sought unsuccessfully to clothe Red China's 400 million women in stylish dresses to replace their formless trousers and jackets. The "central academy of arts and crafts" said Chiang Ching also designed an "imperial robe" for the day when she would ascend Communist China's proletarian throne.
MARCH 23 - Two of Red China's most powerful warlords have openly called for demaoification and challenged Hua Kuo-feng's position as Mao Tse-tung's heir, according to a Communist document intercepted by free Chinese government agents. The document was submitted to the Chinese Communist party central and Hua himself. It was signed by Hsu Shih-yu, commander of the Canton military region, and Wei Kuo-ching.
Peiping expressed pleasure at the "fiasco" suffered by the Congress party of Mrs. Indira Gandhi in the Indian elections and indicated hope of a change in the hitherto pro-Soviet policy of the Indian government.
The Chinese Communist "people's liberation army" headquarters has issued an urgent circular calling on all army men to support the fight against drought, Radio Peiping said.
MARCH 24 - Grain rations in many parts of mainland China have been reduced in the last few weeks. In some areas newly harvested rice is being eaten instead of being stored in granaries, according to travelers reaching Hongkong.
A split is developing among the new powerholders of the Peiping regime. Chao Tze-yang, first secretary of the Szechwan provincial party committee, has turned against Hua Kuo-feng, according to intelligence reports reaching Taipei.
MARCH 25 - Red China's leaders, still wrestling with the problem of purged "vice premier" Teng Hsiao-ping, have been holding a top level meeting in Peiping, Peiping sources said. The meeting was believed to be an enlarged session of the Communist party's politburo.
Mainland China's worst drought in many years has hit a much wider area than hitherto reported, Peiping and provincial radio broadcasts indicated. Radio Peiping said peasants and cadres as far north as Kirin province, as far south as Yunnan province and as far west as Chinghai province are fighting the drought.
Red China probably will import 3.7 million tons of wheat in the 1976-77 season ending June 30, compared with 2.3 million tons in 1975-76, the U.S. Department of Agriculture predicted.
MARCH 26 - A number of staff members of the Red China's "ministry of foreign affairs" and the "central broadcasting affairs bureau" are believed to have been purged, according to intelligence reports reaching Taipei. The report said some 20 high-ranking officials of the "ministry of foreign affairs" and 300 staff members of the "central broadcasting affairs bureau" were arrested.
A Chinese Communist spokesman said reports of reconciliation with the Soviet Union are "nothing but Russian gibberish." The source was Liao Cheng-chili, chairman of Red China's "society for friendship with Japan."
MARCH 27 - Former Chinese Communist "deputy premier" Teng Hsiao-ping will not be reinstated as early as some reports have indicated, the Japanese news agency Kyodo said. The agency quoted a Chinese Communist source as saying Hua Kuo-feng "would choose the time of least political friction for officially reinstating Teng."
The "gang of four" manipulated news photographs as a weapon to oppose the Communist party, NCNA charged. The gang was said to have altered news pictures to put themselves in the spotlight and such opponents as Chou En-lai, Chu Teh and Hua Kuo-feng in the shadows.
Japan is not eager to sign a peace treaty with the Chinese Communists now, a senior Japanese statesman said in Taipei. Naka Funada, former speaker of the Lower House of the Diet and adviser to the ruling Liberal Democratic party, said talks between Tokyo and Peiping on the treaty have been halted.
Bloody clashes between workers of Hengyang, Hunan, and the Chinese Communist army have erupted frequently since late last year, intelligence reports reaching Taipei said. Wall posters attacking Hua Kuo-feng have appeared in that region.
MARCH 28 - A research scientist pooh-poohed the notion that the Chinese mainland is a potentially big market because it has a population of 800 million. Yeh Kung-chia, a senior researcher of the Rand Corporation in the United States, said the idea is wrong because Red China's foreign trade is decided by the regime, not by consumers or business leaders.
Red China notified foreign airlines that Peiping airport would be closed to traffic between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. for 11 days beginning March 31 for maintenance work on runways.
Many small factories in Fukien province in South China have been closed because of drought, the Hongkong newspaper Ming Pao said.
The streets of Sian are still lined with makeshift shelters seven months after it was rocked by a major earthquake centered in neighboring Szechwan. Sian officials say seismologists predict another shock is still possible and the city's 2.5 million people have been warned to remain vigilant.
Red China's" gang of four' disrupted production in two major steel producing centers before being ousted, NCNA said. Administrators from Anshan in Northeast China and Wuhan in Central China disclosed details of the disruptions.
MARCH 29 - Veterans of the "people's liberation army" in Red China "could become serious troublemakers for the regime," Dr. Parris H. Chang, professor of political science at Pennsylvania State University, told the 19th annual convention of the Association for Asian Studies in New York.
Red China has begun making substantial withdrawals from its "war reserve" of rice due to prolonged drought, according to a Hongkong dispatch in the Wall Street Journal.
The "mass surveillance" for some 40 million dissidents on the Chinese mainland works effectively, but the system chills a Western observer. William Safire, New York Times columnist visiting Red China, shuddered at Peiping's way of treating its dissidents.
MARCH 30 - Militia units have been mobilized in some parts of Red China to join the fight against the drought. The mobilization of militia units came a week after regular army units were ordered to join the anti-drought fight.
The Peiping leadership is expected to apply stem disciplinary measures against any party member who deliberately or inadvertently leaks party secrets. This action was indicated in a letter published in the People's Daily. Disclosure of party secrets, the letter warned, "cannot be tolerated."
Peiping confirmed for the first time that Hua Kuo-feng, 56, was from the district of Chiao Cheng, a medium-sized place in the central province of Shansi.
MARCH 31 - A self-described intellectual in Shanghai wrote to U.S. President Jimmy Carter to protest human rights violations in Red China. The three-page letter was received by the Far Eastern Economic Review of Hongkong and forwarded to Carter. "The Chinese mainland today is a hell on earth," the letter said. The writer asked Carter "not to forget the suffering of the 800 million people on the Chinese mainland, who have lost their human rights and to support us with the same commitment you give to the Soviet human rights leaders."
A tense atmosphere pervades Peiping, according to sources in Hongkong. A great number of plainclothes Communist soldiers, policemen and "public security agents" ordered out by the regime's new powerholder, Hua Kuo-feng, were guarding the roads connecting Tienanmen Square and several other gates.
Anti-Communist people in Shanghai and Canton have initiated activities to support the Republic of China and denounce the Peiping regime, according to intelligence reports reaching Taipei.
A major meeting in Peiping is believed to have been concluded, Fox Butterfield reported from Hongkong in the New York Times. The key subject of the unconfirmed meeting seems to have been the return of Teng Hsiao-ping.
APRIL 1 - The London Daily Telegraph reported from Peiping that the North China city of Tangshan is still "a complete mass of unrecognizable wreckage" eight months after being devastated by the world's worst earthquake in 12 years.
A US$182 million sale of soybeans to the Red China was reported by the U.S. Agriculture Department.
Wall posters appeared in Hongkong demanding that Red China release a number of young people "arrested for attacking the Peiping government some years ago in Canton wall posters."
Handbills calling for civil uprising against the Chinese Communists appeared in bulk in Foochow city, South China's political, economic, cultural and transportation center, according to sources in Hongkong.
APRIL 2 - The Peiping regime has appointed Wang En-mao as top boss in Kirin province, according to Radio Kirin. Wang En-mao, former commander of the Sinkiang military region, was disgraced in August of 1968 because of his opposition to the "cultural revolution."
Chinese Communist politics entered the world table tennis championships at Birminghan, England, when Peiping withdrew its No.5 player from a match against an Israeli. Wang Chun failed to turn up for his first-round game against 24-year-old Shlomo Mendelson of Israel, who emigrated from the Soviet Union seven months ago.
Many anti-Hua Kuo-feng posters appeared in Canton in February, according to intelligence reports in Taipei.
APRIL 3 - The commander of the Sinkiang military region, Yang Yung, was seen in Canton early this year, prompting speculation that he may succeed Hsu Shih-yu as commander of the Canton region. There were rumors and speculation that Hsu, and possibly the provincial chief of Kwangtung, Wei Kuo-ching, would join the central leadership in Peiping.
APRIL 5 - Hua Kuo-feng said Red China will continue the policies of Mao Tse-tung.
From a photo-processing plant in Peiping, thousands of copies of a picture of three dead leaders have been sent throughout the Chinese mainland and can be seen posted in factories and schools. The lithograph shows Chou En-lai, flowers in his arms, being welcomed years ago at an airport by Mao Tse-tung and Chu Teh.
The London Daily Telegraph reported from Peiping that Chinese Communist authorities ordered a round-up of weapons in the Northeastern city of Shenyang to prevent further factional violence.
Chinese mainland drought-stricken areas are in a crucial period. If no rainfall is received during the first half of this month, the winter wheat crop of 35-40 million tons may be damaged severely. Other summer crops also could be affected.
APRIL 6 - Soviet bloc diplomats walked out of a "state banquet" after Chinese Communist "vice premier' Li Hsien-nien accused Moscow of organizing a massive invasion of Zaire by mercenaries.
Chen Chu, Chinese Communist "ambassador" to Japan until late last year, is to become" ambassador" to the United Nations, Kyodo reported from Peiping.
Peiping brought a son of Mao Tse-tung into the campaign against the "gang of four." People's Daily printed an article by Mao's son, Mao An-ching, and daughter-in-law, Shao Hua, declaring that "the gang of four slandered a large number of proletarian revolutionaries of the older generation."
Red China will modify the doctrine of self-reliance to build its economy with the help of foreign trade, Frederic A. Moritz reported from Hongkong in the Christian Science Monitor.
APRIL 7 - The Peiping regime will continue to face a scarcity of foreign exchange this year, the Bank of Japan predicted. The bank said this was the reason Red China sold 80 tons of gold ingots on the London bullion market at the end of last year.
Questions were raised about the propriety of a U.S. Congressional delegation visiting the Chinese mainland with expenses paid by the Chinese Communists. Representative Charles Wilson of California insisted that such a trip "violates the rule prohibiting senators and representatives from accepting gifts of over US$100 from any foreign national acting on behalf of a foreign organization or government."
The military is gradually taking over operation of Red China's railroads to halt murders, arson and other acts of sabotage by supporters of Mao Tse-tung's discredited widow Chiang Ching, reports from Peiping said.
APRIL 8 - Taipei sources told of a Chinese Communist factional dispute over the return of Teng Hsiao-ping, former "vice premier." Yeh Chien-ying, Li Hsien-nien, Liu Po-cheng, Hsu Shih-yu and Wei Kuo-ching are on the side of Teng. Wu Teh, Chi Teng-kuei, Chen Hsi-lien, Wang Tung-hsing, Li Teh-sheng and Hua Kuo-feng oppose his rehabilitation.
Disturbances have been reported in over 20 cities on the Chinese mainland since last October, according to Taipei intelligence sources. The most serious were in Shanghai, Nanking, Wuhan, Tsinan, Shihchiachuang, Taiyuan, Paoting, Chengchow, Foochow, Canton and Kweiyang.
Chinese Communist "minister of public health" Liu Hsiang-ping has come under attack in her own "ministry" as a follower of the "gang of four." The mass criticism group of the "ministry" accused Liu, widow of former security chief Hsieh Fu-chih, of painting a negative picture of health work since 1949.
A large number of young refugees from Chekiang province have fled to Canton because of the chaotic situation there, an anti-Communist Hongkong newspaper reported. The Chinese-language Oriental News quoted arrivals from Canton as saying most of the refugees were without money and ration cards.
APRIL 9 - The highly publicized drought on the Chinese mainland is being exaggerated by the regime for political reasons, according to a Peiping dispatch in the Toronto Globe and Mail. The report said the Peiping regime may try to use the anti-drought campaign to squeeze more grain from farmers.
A fire produced "considerable smoke" but no damage at the "Peking Hotel" in Peiping, some 12 hours before President Jimmy Carter's son Chip and an American Congressional delegation arrived for a visit.
APRIL 10 - An anti-Communist organization has been formed in Northern China to sabotage communications, according to an intelligence report reaching Taipei. The "railway guerrilla team" attacked an express train bound for Peiping in Shansi province in February.
Denouncing what they call "ill-intentioned attacks" on profits by the four purged radicals, Chinese Communist leaders have urged factories to make more money to pour into faster economic development. The call came at a conference on finance and banking held at the Taching oil field in Northeast China.
APRIL 11 - Red China already has bought more than twice as much grain from other countries as it did in 1976 and probably will require more if its drought-stricken winter wheat area fails to recuperate, the U.S. Agriculture Department said. Purchases are estimated at 5.1 million tons this calendar year, compared with 2.1 million tons in 1976 and 3.4 million tons in 1975.
Seven members of the Kwangtung provincial revolutionary committee have been purged for having been associated with the "gang of four." One was a veteran cadre, Chao Cho-yun.
APRIL 12 - The commander of Chinese Communist "East China fleet," Ma Lung, died late last month "in line of duty," Radio Chekiang said.
U.S. Secretary of State Cyrus Vance briefed the chief of Red China's liaison mission, Huang Chen, on his recent visit to the Soviet Union. Washington sources said Vance plans a visit to Peiping in November.
APRIL 13 - The army has played and is continuing to playa key role in the stabilization of the political situation in Red China, according to People's Daily.
The biggest stumbling block in the path of Teng Hsiao-ping's rehabilitation is the opposition of "defense minister" Yeh Chien-ying, according to Taipei sources. Hua Kuo-feng is also opposed to restoring Teng to power.
Weng Sen-ho, a sworn confederate of the "gang of four" in Chekiang, has been dealt with "according to law," NCNA reported. The province was known to have been in great chaos due to factional violence and industrial anarchy. Weng was the chief agent of the "gang of four."
The rate of growth of the Chinese Communist economy slowed down in 1976 because of natural catastrophes and political upheavals, the German Institute for Economic Research said. The growth rate was 3.5 per cent, only half of the average in the years 1971-1975, GIER said.
APRIL 14 - Hua Kuo-feng has ordered a freeze on bank accounts held by various organizations, Taipei sources said. The move seemed to indicate an imbalance in the mainland economy.
Hua Kuo-feng is really a member of the "cultural revolution" faction, a Taipei authority on Chinese Communist affairs said.
Supporters of the "gang of four" continue to sabotage railway lines, Radio Nanning reported.
APRIL 15 - An undetermined number of civilian cadets recently mutinied in the Wuchow district of Kwangsi province, attacking an ammunition warehouse, according to an intelligence report reaching Taipei. The group was believed to number over 300.
In two hitherto unpublished 1956 speeches, Mao Tse-tung suggested that Red China would overtake the United States economically in 50 or 60 years but said he was in no hurry to establish diplomatic relations with Washington. In the same year he accused Nikita Khrushchev and the Soviet party of "being blinded by gains" and throwing away revolutionary principle.
Hongkong reports said the "acting mayor" of the strategic southern port city of Amoy, Cheng Chung. has been arrested because of close involvement with the "gang of four."