The Penguin History of Modern China: The Fall and Rise of a Great Power, 1850-2008 - Jonathan Fenby


An excellent book to read if you want to understand how modern China has become what it is now and how it is functioning.

Of course I knew a bit about China, like we all do, but the history for me was no more than snippets.
This book gives you the full picture, the complete history. The starting point of 1850 of this book is well chosen.
From being the poor, very populated country that was kicked around by the more powerful countries of these days things have changed beyond recognition.
The path from The Dowager Empress to Sun Yat Sen, Chiang Kai-shek, Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping and finally Xi Jinping has been painful for the country and caused a lot of victims.
Especially Mao Zedong who officially should be named the biggest crook in history all over the world.
A life in China was never very valuable, but Mao took this principle to the limit.
Like all dictators things were double: there is the wish to let the heritage of the rule continue and pick a strong person who can take over, but then there is the constant fear that this person or his followers can do something to threaten your rule and even your life.
Normally it is sufficient to get this person out of the way. This was done with Lin Biao, formerly known by us as Lin Piao. I never knew how it was done, the books explains this.
More often Mao started big "projects", like the "Big Leap Forwards" or the "Cultural Revolution" to get rid of some people. That this also caused for millions of other people to perish was no problem at all.
So the rigid grip of Xi Jinping on the country is not a surprise for me, it's no more than a continuation of the rule of the Communist Party of China. China has always been ruled centralised, except for the days of the War Lords and the Civil War.
So the change of the governing of Hongkong is not exceptional, nor the desire to get Taiwan back into the grip of China.
All in all this book is a great read, even when you have to read about all the horrors of massacres and famines.

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