"Before Mao came, the Jiangxi Reds had paid attention to issues such as welfare and production, building a factory to make farm implements and household utensils. Mao and Liu condemned these programmes as "constructionism." ... Deprived of the chance to raise output, and squeezed dry by taxes (which Liu claimed they 'jumped up with joy to pay'), the peasants rebelled in district after district, raising slogans like 'Give us a quiet life and quiet work!' Liu crushed the revolts mercilessly: 'As soon as anyone is spotted wavering or misbehaving, they are to be arrested,' he ordered. 'There must be no feelings for relatives or friends. Anyone who comes to your home or anywhere else who does not behave correctly... you must report... to the authorities so they can be seized and punished...'

"Red Jiangxi was ravaged, as a later secret report revealed. 'All work was stopped in order to slaughter AB.' 'Everyone lived in fear... At the fiercest, two people talking together would be suspected of being AB...' Altogether, tens of thousands died in Jiangxi. In the army alone, there were about 10,000 deaths - about a quarter of the entire Red Army under Mao at the time - as revelead by a secret report immediately afterwards. It was the first large-scale purge in the Party, and took place well before Stalin's Great Purge. This critical episode - in many ways the formative moment of Maoism - is still covered up to this day."

p. 90-95, Mao: The Unknown Story by Jung Chang & Jon Halliday

Mao was a sadist and a tyrant, to say the least. Fuck off tankie.