Guards of the Red

When most people hear the term “Red Guards” they either think of the Chinese revolutionary group or of the red guard of Star Wars, who protect the evil Emperor Palpatine. Most people may think that the star wars red guards are a representation of the red guard of China’s revolution but they are not. Although they are an accurate representation of how the real Red Guard protected and followed Mao Zedong.

The Red Guard movement started in the University middle school of Tsinghua. They started by speaking out by making posters on May 25 and June 2nd of 1966 by making a manifesto. When they did this the university shut them down and they had to meet secretly together. It was not until Mao, the chairman and head honcho of communist China, got wind of their movement he had their manifesto broadcast throughout the nation. This event made the Red Guard popular and mainstream in China with groups of red guards appearing across China.
Mao used the Red Guard as his private revolutionary army. The red guards were young people who were wholly invested and believed in Mao’s movement. Mao even meet with them in Tiananmen Square, which ironically would be the place where a massacre would occur years later, protesting the communist government. The red guards were used to destroy China’s past specifically the four olds of Chinese society. These olds were the customs, culture, habits and ideas. They destroyed books, art, museums and religious places. They even attacked intellectuals who were accused of bourgeoisie tendencies and harboring some of the four olds. These people were arrested as counterrevolutionaries and some were even brought before firing squads.

Soon the Red Guard entered the work force their power was contested by the peasants and workers who needed to keep them from taking over in the work place too. By the end of 1966 the leaders of communist china and the Cultural Revolution began to see the red guards as a detriment to the Cultural Revolution and a huge factor to the instability of China. With China’s best interest in mind the Chinese government decided to disband the Red Guard. The disbandment began in the beginning of 1967 and did not occur all too peacefully. It took the army 2 years to completely shut down the Red Guard and make them defunct, which still hold to this day.