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On this episode of China Uncensored,
What is Falun Gong, and Why is it Persecuted?
Hi, welcome to China Uncensored, I'm your host, Chris Chappell.
July 20 is the 15 year anniversary of the Chinese regime's persecution of Falun Gong.
To mark it, I've decided to compile everything I've said previously about Falun Gong in one
episode.
So what is Falun Gong?
Why, just the gravest threat facing China!
Look at them there, standing still!
Or here, sitting still!
Can't someone do something about this menace?!
Yes, good.
Okay.
Oh, wow.
Okay okay I get the idea.
Wow.
So what is Falun Gong and why is this happening to them?
Now, there's nothing I'd like more, than to treat this issue the way most Western media
have--
ignore it and hope that it goes away.
I mean, do you know how hard it is to report on this stuff?
The Communist Party gets a little touchy about Western media reporting on Falun Gong.
Even if the Western journalists want to report on it, that puts media companies in a tight
spot.
Are these companies going to risk getting kicked out of China?
Are they expected to risk losing all that money for a poorly understood spiritual group,
just because it's the right thing to do?
I mean just the other day I heard about this crazy group of people who believe in drinking
some poor guy's blood and eating his flesh.
Sounds like those sickos should be fed to lions for sport.
I mean, I'm sure there's no way people might have some misunderstandings about a heavily
persecuted and suppressed underground spiritual movement.
When there's a massive regime trying to spread misinformation about it.
Ah, if only there was an Ancient Rome Uncensored
But, since this is China Uncensored, I guess I'll have to try and clear up some of the
misunderstandings about Falun Gong, myself.
Have you heard of qigong?
Qigong is a broad term for movements meant to exercise the flow of qi, or energy, through
the body, that's supposed to be good for the health.
Think of Taichi as an example.
Falun Gong, which is also called Falun Dafa, includes 5 qigong exercises.
I think we can all clearly see why this is a threat to the Party.
Falun Gong also has roots in Buddhist and Taoist philosophy and thought, so you get
talk about things like karma and reincarnation, tranquility,
giving up anger and jealousy, trying to be less selfish.
Now, Li Hongzhi, the man who first taught Falun Gong publicly in 1992, claims that he
was taught a version of Falun Gong from a master when he was young.
And that the practice had been passed down from a single master to a single disciple
for a very long time.
But, just because there are hundreds of traditional Chinese practices like Falun Gong,
passed down through the generations in exactly the same way,
does that mean it’s true?
I mean, look at the symbol of Falun Gong, the Falun or Law Wheel.
That's a swastika, a symbol of pure evil, no matter how many thousands of years people
have been using it before Hitler.
Really? This is from 10,000 BC?
But it gets worse.
Whereas qigong usually is just about doing exercises to keep fit and healthy, Falun Gong
goes beyond that,
and requires its practitioners to live their lives based on three dangerous, subversive
principles:
Truth, Compassion, and Tolerance.
Luckily, there are those willing to stand up to this madness.
After the Communist Party started persecuting Falun Gong in 1999, state-run Xinhua News
Agency wrote,
“The so-called 'truth, kindness and forbearance' principle preached by Li has nothing in common
with the socialist ethical and cultural progress we are striving to achieve."
Thank you, Xinhua.
Now there is the voice of the people.
I mean, Truth, Compassion, Tolerance?
If everyone followed that, China wouldn't have the kind of systemic corruption that
has made China great.
Corruption is why people the world over know the reputation of Chinese baby formula.
And you know what they say, there’s no such thing as bad publicity.
So, obviously, the only people who would be interested in this kind of thing would be
a few, probably poor, elderly, uneducated women from the countryside.
I mean, the facts speak for themselves!
When Li Hongzhi gave his first seminar in ’92,
it was to a little over a hundred people in a middle school in Changchun, Jilin Province.
7 years later, according to surveys taken by the government, there were 100 million
people practicing it?
Wait, is that right?!
That would have been one out of every 12 people in China practicing Falun Gong.
Huh. I don't think, poor, uneducated peasant women can really cover that.
Actually, it even seems like some pretty high-ranking people in the Communist Party were practicing.
And in every park in China, you could see more people practicing Falun Gong than even
Taichi.
It was also spreading overseas pretty rapidly.
Man, Li Hongzhi must have been making a fortune!
On all of the…free public workshops…and…free online books…and especially when people
were going around teaching their friends and family the exercises…for free.
So why was this becoming such a big thing?
Well, China, as you may know, is not exactly, well, it's a sludge-coated wasteland.
People tend to get sick, and healthcare was becoming a problem.
But apparently, one of the big draws of Falun Gong was that people were reporting a lot
of health benefits--even some rather miraculous ones.
People with cancer, tuberculosis, paralysis, all kinds of nasty stuff, were getting better.
So many people were getting healthier from the practice, that government organizations
started calling Falun Gong a beneficial public health activity,
and it was praised in state-run media and by Chinese officials.
If you took a walk in the park this morning, you can see that the recent hard work the
government has put into public health activities has not been wasted.
Every morning starting from 5 to 6 am the city’s green grass, parks, and public squares
become a morning exercise heaven.
Wait, a minute!
Isn't state run media always telling me how evil Falun Gong is?!
Oh my, if you can't trust state-run media, who can you trust?!
So for years, the government was actually promoting Falun Gong because of all the health
benefits people were experiencing.
But more than that, China researchers tend to point out that Falun Gong filled a spiritual
vacuum that had been left in China after the Cultural Revolution.
Falun Gong was a traditional, Chinese kind of spirituality that appealed to Chinese people.
At a time when making money was the only thing considered important, and getting rich was
glorious,
people liked something that taught them life was bigger than the size of your bank account.
And Falun Gong really must have meant a lot to people, considering anyone's practicing
it after how hard the Chinese regime has been trying to crush them.
In 1999, then Chinese leader Jiang Zemin declared the Party had to eradicate Falun Gong.
The people’s daily reports that Falun Gong is an evil cult.
Falun Dafa is an illegal organization and the decision is to outlaw it.
Since then, Falun Gong practitioners have disappeared, been tortured, raped, and killed
in labor camps and prisons, sent to mental institutions,
even become the cornerstone of China's organ “donation” system, as they, have their,
organs, ripped out and sold.
And in the 15 years this persecution, genocide, has been going on, Falun Gong practitioners
have never fought back with violence.
They have, however, been trying to tell people about all of the stuff that’s happening
to them in China.
Which, really, is almost as bad.
Why are Falun Gong practitioners always trying to give China a bad name?
I mean, they claim they're a peaceful meditation qigong practice or whatever, but they're clearly
getting political.
That's what I often hear Chinese people complain about is political; that Falun Gong is political.
No, the way you're supposed to handle it, when Chinese authorities do something bad
to you, is…well, definitely don’t question why they’re doing that.
Just keep your head down and try not to think about it.
Definitely don’t talk about it, ever.
It’s worked in the past, right?
That way, the Party can keep all those horrible crimes against humanity behind the scenes.
Then, they can put on some nice shows like the Olympics opening ceremony, or get placed
on the UN Human Rights council,
and then everyone in the world thinks China's great! And that's what really benefits the
Chinese people.
Because the Party says so.
But so why did Jiang Zemin launch the persecution against Falun Gong?
To understand what really happened, you need to understand how Jiang Zemin came to power.
Now, in case you didn't know, politics in China is a fairly dangerous game
In China, you're either rising in power, or getting purged.
And when you're at the top, that just means everyone else is gunning for you.
Case in point, these two guys, Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang.
China was just emerging from the decade of horror that was the Cultural Revolution.
Deng Xiaoping, the guy in charge at the time, began a policy of reform and opening up.
In other words, China was allowed to have an economy again.
If you ever have trouble remembering his name, just think, with economic reforms, this guy
didn't want Chinese people to ever be done shopping.
Now Deng called Hu and Zhao his "left and right hands."
Together, they implemented Deng's economic reforms.
But they had their eye on some political reforms as well.
They proposed an increase in government transparency, and pushed for greater accountability from
officials, Hu believed in more freedom of speech and of the press.
They also launched an anti-corruption campaign that even targeted the children of top-ranking
Party elders.
Hu Yaobang apologized for the misrule of Tibet by the Party and pushed for greater Tibetan
autonomy.
What happened?! Why can't we have that China?!
Well, that's where the Party hardliners, or "conservatives" come in.
They weren't too fond of that whole, let's loosen the reins of power and let's investigate
our children thing Zhao and Hu were proposing.
Ultimately Hu alienated a lot of people and was forced to resign.
Sorry Tibet!
Problem is, even though he made a lot of enemies in the Party, he was really, really popular
with the people.
And so when he died in April 1989, 50,000 students came to Tiananmen Square to participate
in his memorial service.
Then they figured, well, while we're here, might as well hold some protests. And the
hardliners thought, eh, not so much.
The Tiananmen Square Massacre marked the end of the hope for political reform.
Li Peng, the premier at the time, pushed for getting the students out of the Square by
force declared martial law on May 20
and he and other hardliners blamed Zhao Ziyang for the protests and got him stripped of all
power.
Zhao Ziyang spent the next 15 years under house arrest until his death in 2005.
But now there was a problem.
I mean, besides the piles of corpses in the streets of Beijing.
Zhao was supposed to be Deng’s successor.
Who would replace Deng as the "Paramount leader?"
They needed to find a compromise, someone conservative enough to please the hardliners,
but not so conservative that they would stop Deng's economic reforms.
And that man in the end was Jiang Zemin, the Party Chief of Shanghai.
He had quickly supported the hardliners' decision to use force against the students, which they
liked, and he had taken care of a little problem for Deng, which he liked.
The thing is, no one really liked Jiang.
Nowadays, the Chinese youth today lovingly refer to Jiang as haha.
That's because he kind of looks like a toad, which in Chinese is hama.
So they just changed a letter and turned him into a living joke.
And that's about as much respect people had for him back then too.
Since he was from Shanghai, he had a very small powerbase in Beijing.
The Beijing clique, as it came to be known, was led by Beijing mayor Chen Xitong, who
became Jiang's political rival.
It was even believed that prominent a military general and his brother, the President of
China, were plotting a coup against him.
That was only stopped when Deng Xiaoping, who still was wielding real power behind the
scenes, forced the president to retire, and gave the position to Jiang,
making him both the head of the Communist Party and the quote un quote president of
China, a tradition that carries on to this day.
That's not to say Deng liked Jiang either.
During his famous Southern Tour in 1992, he specifically stopped by Shanghai, Jiang's
powerbase,
and said the pace of economic reform wasn't fast enough, and that "central leadership,"
in other words Jiang, was to blame.
That was also right around the time Deng appointed Jiang's successor, Hu Jintao, who would replace
Jiang at the 2002 National People's Congress.
Hu Jintao was the man Deng really wanted to carry on his policies.
So Jiang had until Hu came to power to create for himself a powerbase, or else possibly
face the kind of political purge that befell so many others.
So he started purging all the other jerks that got in his way.
First up was Chen Xitong, who was thrown out of office in 1995 after a corruption investigation,
and then sentenced to 16 years in jail.
His son was also sentenced.
By the way, you'll want to remember that whole, corruption investigation as a ploy to take
out your political rivals.
It happens kind of a lot.
However, because Jiang focused all his energy on internal political struggles, China wasn't
in such great shape.
Systemic government corruption, a surge in organized crime, unemployment, environmental
destruction,
and an ever-growing wealth gap threatened the regime's grip on the country.
Whoa, I'm getting déjà vu.
So what did Jiang do?
He began a massive propaganda campaign to show how great he was.
Starting sometime after 1996, he made sure state-run People's Daily and the 7pm CCTV
national news always carried stories about him as the top news.
That was a policy that would remain in effect until 2006; four years after Jiang officially
stepped down.
At the same time state-run media was praising him, he was also using it to crush his political
opponents, like Chen Xitong.
That didn't sit too well with other Party leaders.
Using the media to smash political rivals and promote a personality cult was something
that fell out of favor
after Mao Zedong kind of used it to ignite the chaos of the Cultural Revolution,
so it was pretty frowned upon in the Deng Xiaoping era.
And when Deng died in 97, Jiang lost the closest thing he had to support.
So as the 1990's were coming to a close, Jiang's position looked shakier than ever.
Jiang needed something that would cement his power after retirement.
And in China, there's one way for that to happen: Control the police, control the army.
But how was he going to do that?
On April 25, 1999, Jiang got his answer.
Now as someone trying desperately to stay on top,
why won’t any of those jerks just like him?
It must have been frustrating Jiang Zemin to see how incredibly popular Falun Gong,
and its founder Li Hongzhi, were becoming, seemingly without even trying.
Li was even invited to speak at government-sponsored events, like this event hosted by the Ministry
of Public Security.
And after that event, the People’s Public Security Daily wrote an article praising Li
for his contributions
"in promoting the traditional crime-fighting virtues of the Chinese people, in safeguarding
social order and security, and in promoting rectitude in society."
Come on, People’s Public Security Daily, what about Jiang Zemin’s contributions to
"safeguarding social order and security?"
Now wouldn't it be great, if Jiang could take Falun Gong down a peg, while at the same time
cementing his own power base in the Party?
Remember, Jiang rose to power by supporting the Tiananmen Square Massacre.
He knew what kind of fears mass movements could inspire in the Party and he learned
his lesson from that.
So for the later half of the 90s, Jiang tried repeatedly to make Falun Gong seem like a
threat.
China has a history of rebellions being started by mystics and religious leaders, so if he
could make Falun Gong look dangerous,
he could convince the other Party officials that they needed to fight the threat by beefing
up the security apparatus, which he could then control.
So Jiang could be the valiant savior of China.
But Jiang's greatest enemy stood in his way--facts.
Jiang launched a nationwide investigation into Falun Gong trying to dig something up
he could use against them.
And since this is China after all, investigations usually involved tapping phone lines, spying
on people, and raiding homes.
No expense was spared.
And the investigation, well, let's just say, they didn't turn up anything.
In 1997, China's Public Security Bureau launched an investigation to determine whether Falun
Gong should be labeled a “heretical organization”
They determined, "No evidence has appeared thus far."
In 98, an investigation by the National Sports Commission of China concluded, "We’re convinced
the exercises and effects of Falun Gong are excellent.
It has done an extraordinary amount to improve society’s stability and ethics.”
An extremely influential retired general in the People's Liberation Army, with impeccable
Party credentials, Li Qihua,
who said he began fighting the communist cause when he was 10, wrote an article saying China's
leaders should look kindly on Falun Gong,
and that they should actually start practicing because it would improve their physical and
mental health.
And an investigation by Qiao Shi, Chairman of the National People's Congress, third most
powerful person in the Communist Party,
and biggest political rival of Jiang Zemin at the time, found,
"Falun Gong has hundreds of benefits for the Chinese people and nation, and does not a
bit of harm."
It's like these idiots have something against launching a baseless political campaign against
harmless people!
Don't worry though, that would actually be one of the last things Qiao Shi did as a public
official. With the help of Bo Yibo, father of Bo Xilai,
Jiang defeated Qiao Shi in a power struggle and forced him into retirement.
So the investigations weren't really working out, but gosh darn it, that wouldn’t stop
Jiang Zemin from trying to discredit Falun Gong.
In 1996, the Falun Gong books, which were bestsellers, were banned from official publication.
In 98, articles attacking Falun Gong start appearing in state-run media.
Police began stopping people from exercising in parks, and started searching people’s
homes.
And on April 25, 1999, Jiang Ze Min finally got what he was looking for.
10,000 Falun Gong practitioners assembled outside the Central Appeals Office, right
next to Zhongnanhai, the leadership compound of the Communist Party.
They were petitioning in response to the arrest and beating of 45 practitioners in Tianjin
the previous day.
They lined up, appealed for official recognition and an end to escalating harassment, and hours
later, left as quickly and quietly as they came.
It was the largest demonstration in Beijing since the 1989 Tiananmen Protests.
Jackpot!
So what, if the premier, Zhu Rongji, met with the Falun Gong practitioners, and the issue
was peacefully resolved.
Jiang Zemin was there to stoke the flames.
He argued that if they didn't act quickly, the Party would lose control of China!
Don't worry though!
Jiang said he could wipe out Falun Gong and in just three months.
The only problem is, Jiang said, since there were 70-100 million Falun Gong practitioners,
they had “infiltrated” all levels of the Party, even the highest ranks of the military
and security bureaus.
So it would be necessary for him to create a security force that had unlimited power
and existed outside the law,
and outside the control of any other government body and answered only to him or someone appointed
by him.
And that was how Jiang Zemin created the 610 Office, named after the day it was created,
June 10, 1999--almost a decade to the day of the Tiananmen massacre.
And the 610 Office sprang into action on July 20.
Journalist Ian Johnson, who won a Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of the crackdown on
Falun Gong, describes the purpose of the 610 Office was,
"to crush Falun Gong, no measures too excessive.
Within days a wave of arrests swept China.
By the end of 1999, Falun Gong adherents were dying in custody.”
Now giving this kind of unlimited power to Jiang Zemin, that didn't sound too appealing
to the other 6 members of the Politburo Standing Committee,
the highest echelon of power in China.
Especially Hu Jintao.
But Jiang bought off Li Lanqing by making him the first head of the ultra powerful 610
Office.
Li Peng didn't have too much of a problem, because, well, he did push for the Tiananmen
Square Massacre, so he didn't mind bloodshed.
But also because Jiang had already made his protégé Luo Gan the head of the Political
and Legislative Affairs Committee.
Which controls all of China's internal security forces and wink wink was about to see a major
expansion, and promised him control of the 610 office after Li Lanqing stepped down.
As for the other three they didn't really support the persecution.
And, funny thing, they didn't have careers after 2002.
That was during the 16th National People's Congress.
Not only did Jiang knock out his rivals, as the final kicker, he upped the number of Standing
Committee Members to 9, filling the extra spaces with his people
Man, Luo Gan really had a lot of power.
Jiang Ze Min had finally fixed his game.
He was able to retire in 2002 and control things from behind the scenes just as his
predecessor Deng Xiao Ping had done.
And maybe now everyone will love him!
So even though Hu Jintao officially became China’s top leader that year, he and his
premier Wen Jiabao had next to no power.
That's why Jiang, technically retired, would always sit right next to Hu at important meetings
and meet personally with important world leaders.
Wow, look at those two.
The political future that Deng Xiaoping had given Hu Jintao had been stolen by Jiang Zemin.
That's how Hu went from this happy go lucky guy, to wood face, as some Chinese started
calling him.
Meanwhile, the 610 Office, along with the number of police and secret police, kept growing
in size and power.
Officials were using eliminating Falun Gong as the main excuse to amass personal fortunes.
The message was clear: if you want to move up in the Communist Party, help persecute
Falun Gong.
No one took that to heart quite like this guy, Zhou Yongkang.
He used to be the Party Secretary of Sichuan Province from 2001-2002.
But then he made a very important life decision.
Some people, like his own son, think he had his first wife murdered.
That way, he was able to marry Jiang Zemin's niece.
And suddenly he went from an official in way out Sichuan, to being hand selected by Jiang
as head of the Ministry of Public Security,
even though he had no experience with police work.
Then, in 2007, he got on the Politburo Standing Committee, and replaced Luo Gan, becoming
the head of both the PLAC.
That's the organization that controls all those police, secret police, paramilitary
police, and pretty much the entire legal system, plus, the 610 Office.
No one has ever made it into top leadership by working for the security forces. Until
Zhou Yongkang.
Zhou grip on power grew by massively expanding China's labor camp system.
At its peak, half of all those detained in China's labor camps were Falun Gong practitioners.
Not only that, but for a few years he was able to get a budget for China's internal
security forces worth billions more than the army's budget.
He also had a staff of 10 million, while there were only 2.5 million in the army!
But while Jiang and his allies used persecuting Falun Gong to glut their power, there was
one tiny little problem.
Instead of being wiped out, Falun Gong grew and spread around the world.
And one thing they seemed pretty fond of doing was exposing everything Jiang and his cronies
were doing.
Jiang’s persecution of Falun Gong was becoming a huge liability and an international embarrassment
for China.
The end result was a political stalemate between Jiang's faction, and Hu Jintao's.
And that's why up until 2012, no significant political changes and decisions were made
in China.
The Communist Party was in deadlock.
The very power that Jiang’s side had gained through persecuting Falun Gong became the
biggest weapon of their rivals.
And it was about to all come crashing down.
If we've learned anything from the Communist Party, it's that the power struggle isn't
over until the fat lady sings.
Even though Jiang retired and moved his people into position, they’re not safe.
Now that they’ve amassed all this power by persecuting Falun Gong, they've got a giant
target on their backs.
So now it’s time to play Communist Party Takedown™.
That's a registered trademark.
Who’s our lucky first contestant?
Looks like it’s everybody’s least favorite princeling, Bo Xilai!
Bo is the son of prominent Party elder, Bo Yibo.
You might remember him from the last episode, when he helped Jiang get rid of a little problem
named Qiao Shi in 1998.
In return, Jiang made Bo Xilai one of his people, and helped him move up the Communist
ladder.
Now let's meet contestant number two!
Bo Xilai’s right hand man, Wang Lijun.
When Bo and Wang were in Liaoning province, they both persecuted Falun Gong practitioners
with gusto.
Bo expanded the labor camp system, and more Falun Gong adherents were sent to labor camps
there than in any other province.
There’s also evidence that Wang Lijun personally oversaw forced organ harvesting from Falun
Gong practitioners.
So for taking part in his benefactor's genocide, lets see what they won, folks!
Promotion after promotion!
Now he could stop there, or risk it all for whatever's behind these doors.
Behind door number 1, is a fabulous promotion to the position of Vice Premier, followed
by membership in the 9-member Politburo Standing Committee,
The inner, inner circle of the Party--possibly by taking over the seat of fellow Jiang faction
member and persecution buddy, Zhou Yongkang, when Zhou retired.
That would make him the heir of the Jiang faction.
And maybe even someday…the supreme leader.
Instead he choose what's behind door number 2.
Purged, sorry Bo. That's how things go sometimes.
You see, then leaders Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao started fighting back against Jiang’s faction.
So Wen said that Bo was too much of a liability to become vice-premier, because Falun Gong
practitioners kept bringing lawsuits against Bo whenever he went overseas on state business.
And not too many people argued.
So instead of becoming vice-premier, Bo Xilai was sent off to become Party chief of Chongqing,
a huge, troubled provincial-level city in southwest China.
Chongqing was supposed to be the dead end to Bo’s career.
The thing is, Bo was ruthless and a flamboyant self-promoter and he wasn't going down without
a fight.
He brought Wang Lijun in as police chief, and together they struck terror into the hearts
of anyone who opposed Bo in Chongqing.
Bo also started the "Chongqing model," a mix of populism and economic development that
directly challenged the leadership.
And got him a lot of good press.
Behind the scenes, Bo was still working with Zhou Yongkang.
And doing things like wiretapping Hu Jintao’s phone calls.
I’m gonna say, he overreached himself there.
Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao decided to take Bo down, and they start by investigating Wang
Lijun.
You see, in a traditional Communist takedown, you don’t go directly for the guy, you start
with his associates.
Wang and Bo both knew how Communist takedowns work, so they both freak out.
Bo refuses to protect Wang, so Wang, afraid that Bo will kill him, flees to the US consulate.
Setting in motion the most interesting year that China journalists have ever had.
Luckily, Bo’s wife, Gu Kailai, has also possibly murdered a British man named Neil
Heywood.
So that whole thing massively distracts everyone and partially conceals the takedown and ongoing
power struggle.
So at the end of 2013, Wang, Gu, and Bo are all in prison for corruption, murder, and
corruption.
Hu Jintao steps down, and instead of a rising starlet in Jiang's camp, the new leader of
China becomes Xi Jinping.
But the power struggle isn’t over.
So who’s next?
It’s Zhou Yongkang, Bo Xilai’s persecution buddy, and the next highest person in Jiang
Zemin’s chain of command.
I’ve talked before about how Xi Jinping has tried to cut out Zhou’s powerbase, by
doing things like reducing the influence of his former position,
ending the labor camp system Zhou expanded to persecute Falun Gong, and investigating
Zhou’s cronies in the oil industry for, 14.5 billion dollars worth of corruption.
Surprisingly, by which I mean, completely unsurprisingly, people who are willing to
beat peaceful meditators to death in order to gain power,
are also the same kind of people who dabble in massive amounts of corruption on the side.
They used the persecution to get the power, and they used the power to get the money.
But Xi Jinping can just use his anti-corruption campaign to take all of them down, so he can
become supreme leader.
And there are already signs that it’s not going to end with Zhou.
Li Dongsheng, the former head of the 610 Office, is already being investigated.
And there are reports that Zeng Qinghong, who was Jiang Zemin’s right hand man, is
next.
So where has Jiang Zemin been through all of this?
As his people get knocked down, Jiang has tried to “stay above the fray.”
There were reports that he supported the removal of Bo Xilai, so he’s willing to sacrifice
people in the hopes that it will end there.
But according to the Financial Times, Jiang recently warned Xi Jinping that
“the footprint of this anti-corruption campaign cannot get too big.”
Sounds like someone's getting a bit nervous.
And with rumors that his son and grandson are being investigated, it sounds like he
should be.
The power struggle is still ongoing though, because Jiang’s faction is still fighting
back.
They need to stay in power, so that they can make sure the things they did to get power
stay under wraps.
So, I know what you’re thinking.
Chris, if Jiang and his cronies gained power through persecuting Falun Gong, and many of
the Party leadership never supported the persecution in the first place.
Why doesn’t Xi Jinping just stop persecuting Falun Gong and use that to take down Jiang’s
faction, instead of using an anti-corruption campaign?
First of all, don't question me.
Secondly, it's complicated.
The Falun Gong issue touches on a key issue for the Communist Party--freedom of belief.
The Party has never allowed religious freedom;
if you want to attend church or go to a temple, you have to go to the church or the temple
that are directly sanctioned and controlled by the Communist Party.
So reversing that position and letting people practice Falun Gong freely would be difficult.
And stopping the persecution would mean admitting that doing it was wrong in the first place.
The Party has never admitted wrongdoing for anything, except the Cultural Revolution,
which they only did because it directly threatened the Party, and they managed to blame it all
on Mao’s wife.
How could they redress the Falun Gong issue?
Wouldn't the people who were imprisoned, or those whose friends and family died, demand
justice?
They also have to admit that everything in state-run media about Falun Gong for the past
15 years was just something they made up.
So bringing up Falun Gong would be a huge political risk for Xi Jinping, especially
since he doesn’t have unlimited power yet.
So could he just, quietly stop putting Falun Gong people in jail, and just not address
it publicly?
That's also impossible, because of all the different powerbases that Jiang set up for
the persecution, like the 610 office and all of the security departments that were under
Zhou Yongkang.
There would have to be a direct order from the top of the Politburo Standing Committee
to stop the persecution; there's no way to do it quietly.
So where does that leave us?
The power struggle will continue, but as long as the persecution of Falun Gong remains unresolved,
it will be a problem for the Communist Party.
But resolving it is also a problem for the Communist Party.
A decade and a half ago, Jiang Zemin said Falun Gong would destroy the Communist Party.
But ironically, as Xi Jinping deals with the consequences of decades of abuse by Jiang's
faction,
could Jiang’s persecution of Falun Gong be what destroys the Party in the end?
Thanks for watching this special episode of China Uncensored.
Share this episode with your friends and help get the word out there.
Once again I'm Chris Chappell, see you next time.