In August 1966, Chinese Communist Party Chairman Mao Zedong formally launched the Cultural Revolution at the 11th plenary session of the Eighth Central Committee. Mao had been head of the People's Republic of China since its founding in 1949, and by 1966 he felt that the country was following the Soviet Union in becoming over-bureaucratized. He called for a new revolution, led by youth, that would sweep away bourgeois values in Chinese society and bring vitality back to the Communist Party leadership. He closed the schools and encouraged youth to join the Red Guards--quasi-military groups that persecuted teachers, intellectuals, and the elderly and enforced Mao's cult of personality. The Red Guards soon began fighting among themselves, and anarchy reigned. Thousands were slaughtered, and the Chinese economy suffered greatly. The arts were restricted to modern communist forms, and many ancient Chinese treasures were destroyed. Mao later expressed regrets for the excesses of the...