1966 Mao Zedong's slogan "Fire at the headquarters!"

50 years ago, on August 5, 1966, the leader of communist China, Mao Zedong, issued the slogan "Fire at headquarters!" This was the beginning of the so-called Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. Its purpose was declared to be "criticism of revisionism and bureaucracy" in the party apparatus within the framework of the direct dictatorship of the proletariat.

Hongweiping students ("Red Guards") and zaofani ("rebels") workers began to storm the premises of party committees and university administrations, throwing the leadership out into the street. The repressions during the "cultural revolution" were aimed mainly at the intelligentsia, as well as at the middle-level party leadership. Millions of people were sent to "re-education" in labor camps.