Echoes of Mao in Modern Chinese Intelligence Operations

 Mao Zedong: the Real Architect of Chinese Communist Intelligence

Chinese traitors spying for the US on PRC industrial production; from an educational comic book (1955) 

Today is the 40th anniversary of the passing of Mao Zedong, who led the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to its 1949 victory and ruled the People's Republic until his death in 1976.

Mao left many legacies, but perhaps the least discussed is his heavy influence on Chinese communist intelligence, police, and security work, and the ways it carries over to the present day.

Mao was not the founder of the CCP intelligence and security apparatus, but he was its most influential architect.*

Echoes today from the era of Mao include:

- the use of standard espionage techniques, originally inspired by the Russians, in conducting operations (not the so-called "grains of sand" approach);
- reliance on Marxist orthodoxy in intelligence analysis;
- a regular search for enemies within, possibly including quotas in the harvest;
- the assumed suspicion, until proven otherwise, of foreigners on Chinese soil;
- gross over-classification of mundane data, placing ordinary foreign business activity at risk of prosecution;
- and the tragic use of torture by security forces to accomplish truthful interrogation results, in spite of official denials.

An under-studied but vital question: has PRC intelligence analysis gone beyond orthodoxy and moved closer to objective consideration of intelligence information?  

* In its early days (1926-1935), Zhou Enlai founded and guided the apparatus.  But when the CCP's first effective intelligence organ, the Special Services Section (中央特科, Zhongyang Teke, 1927-35), was abolished during the Long March, Mao was the Party's ascendant, albeit not yet fully dominant, leader.  By the time "Mao Zedong Thought" was enshrined as orthodoxy in 1945, Mao firmly controlled all CCP intelligence and police functions, approving all leadership changes, major policies, and reorganizations.