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The politburo meeting was scheduled for February 15, 1975.

I met with Zhou Enlai in the 305 Hospital the night before, briefing him on the results of our latest tests on Mao and telling him about the controversy over the glucose infusions. Zhou's health was so precarious that I suggested he not come to the meeting.

But he wanted to be there. The politburo was about to learn the full extent of Mao's illness. He wondered if I was ready to deliver my report and warned me to be fully prepared for Jiang Qing's hostile questions. He thought it best not to mention disagreements over the glucose. The situation was complicated enough.

The medical team arrived at the Great Hall of the People at a little after two o'clock in the afternoon on February 15. The politburo was already in session. Wang Dongxing came out to discuss our presentation. I explained that we would begin with my description of the general state of Mao's health. Then Wu Jie would describe the problems with his heart and lungs and Huang Kewei would describe the amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. Zhang Xiaolou would explain the cataract problem, and Li Xuande would present X rays, further detailing Mao's heart and lung condition. All of us had diagrams, charts, and models as visual aids. I would close the discussion by detailing the team's suggested course of treatment.

Wang reiterated the importance of the meeting, pointing out that Zhou Enlai was attending despite the gravity of his illness and encouraging us to speak loudly since Deng Xiaoping was hard of hearing and would be learning about Mao's illness for the first time.

When we entered the conference room, Zhou Enlai, Deng Xiaoping, and Ye Jianying were seated at the center of a long conference table, flanked by the other members of the politburo. The medical team was asked to sit at the opposite end of the table. I felt that we were on trial.

We had discussed Mao's case so many times that the presentation went smoothly. We presented all the medical facts, including the statistical survival rate for other patients suffering from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, letting the politburo members draw their own conclusions about Mao's own life expectancy. No one directly referred to his death. When Huang Kewei began trying to explain amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, most of the politburo members were confused.

Jiang Qing led the questioners. “You say this is a rare disease,” she said. “How did Chairman get it? What is your evidence?”

We had no answers to many of Jiang Qing's questions. No one knew what caused motor neuron disease. Huang Kewei was patient, answering every question thoroughly, spending two hours drawing on every analogy he could to make his point. When his audience did not understand his explanation of paralysis of the diaphragm and intercostal muscles, Huang likened the muscles to pork-chop meat. Yao Wenyuan rebuked him for being disrespectful of the Chairman.

Huang panicked at the reprimand, stammered, and was unable to continue.

Zhou Enlai intervened, lauding the doctors for their thoroughness and thanking us all for our work. He suggested that we now discuss treatment.

I was responsible for reporting. I explained that we could operate on the cataracts but first wanted to test the possible procedures on other patients similar in age and health to the Chairman. I raised the question of nasal feeding, arguing how important it was to supply Mao with nutrients.

Jiang Qing interrupted again. “A nasal feeding means inserting a tube into the stomach,” she said. “I know this procedure, and it is very painful. Does this mean you want to torture the Chairman?”

Deng Xiaoping interjected by pointing out that one of the old revolutionary marshals, Liu Bocheng, had been on nasal feeding for a long time. He wondered whether Mao had agreed to the procedure.

I said that he had not.

Deng urged us not to force Mao into anything, saying we should explain the situation to him patiently, waiting for his agreement before inserting the tube. Like most of the other top leaders, he too had difficulty believing there was no cure for the motor neuron disease, but he urged us to do all we could to control the symptoms and arrest its progress. He urged caution, too, in treating the cataracts and hoped we would learn as much as we could about how an eye operation would affect Mao's heart and motor neuron disease. He urged us to do our best and put Wang Dongxing in charge of procuring whatever equipment and medicine we might need. “The party wishes to thank you,” he said finally.

Zhou Enlai echoed Deng's thanks, and Deng repeated once more, “The party wishes to thank you,” before we were dismissed. The other members of the politburo had no reaction at all. By remaining silent, they absolved themselves of responsibility for Mao. Nevertheless the words of thanks were comforting, particularly after Jiang Qing's hostility, and we left the meeting considerably relieved. The underlying fear remained, however. We knew that if any member of the politburo concluded that we had done anything wrong, the gratitude would cease and the attacks against us would begin. And any of us could be removed from the team at any time if we were ever deemed politically suspect.

That March, not long after the politburo meeting, Jiang Qing and her Shanghai friends Zhang Chunqiao and Yao Wenyuan launched yet another campaign against Deng Xiaoping and other veteran leaders. This time they cited “empiricism,” meaning experience as opposed to theory, as the target of attack, and Yao Wenyuan listed empiricism as the principal enemy in an article called “On the Social Foundation of the Lin Biao Anti-Party Group.” It was an attack against the old Long March leaders, most of whom were peasants with little education but much political experience and who were then being rehabilitated in growing numbers. Their legitimacy was tied to their age, their experience, and their sacrifice and stamina during the Long March. Jiang Qing, Zhang Chunqiao, and Yao Wenyuan were decades younger than the Long March generation, and they were seen as party intellectuals, educated but with limited practical experience. The terms of the high-level power struggles were growing increasingly arcane, and few ordinary Chinese could have understood what the new campaign was about. It was a struggle between the younger cadres who had been promoted in the wake of the Cultural Revolution purges and the purged veterans who were returning to power. The ailing Zhou Enlai and the newly reinstated Deng Xiaoping were the primary targets.

Mao's health now prevented him from day-to-day involvement in his wife's continuing struggle for power, but when he learned of the attacks on empiricism, he lashed out against them. In April, he declared that dogmatism was just as bad as empiricism, because both were deviations from Marxism-Leninism and therefore revisionist. Jiang Qing and her faction were the dogmatists, and Mao was now chastising them.

At a politburo meeting of May 3, 1975, Mao went further. He dictated a note to Zhang Yufeng, who gave it to emissaries Nancy Tang and Wang Hairong. “You detest only empiricism, not dogmatism,” he told the group, directing his comments at Jiang Qing and her faction. He said the Wang Ming faction had dominated the party for four years by holding high the banner of the Comintern to intimidate the Chinese Communist party and strike down those who did not agree. “You should all believe in Marxism-Leninism, not revisionism. Be united, not split. Be aboveboard, not involved in plots and intrigues. Don't form a Gang of Four.… As I see it, those who criticize empiricism are themselves believers in empiricism.”

After Mao's criticisms, Deng Xiaoping presided over politburo meetings. While Wang Dongxing told me that Deng often criticized Jiang Qing and her associates, and he clearly won the battle over empiricism, Deng never attempted to have Mao's wife and her faction purged, though Jiang Qing's goal was always to get rid of him. Wang was amazed that Deng did not use his new power to get rid of her.

Deng was clever, and so was Zhou Enlai. Both men knew that despite Mao's criticisms of his wife and her associates, he intended only to limit their power, not to quash it. When Kang Sheng, bedridden with cancer, learned that Mao was displeased with his wife, he mistakenly assumed that the Chairman was prepared to see her overthrown. As he had throughout his life, he began inventing charges, claiming that Jiang Qing and Zhang Chunqiao had betrayed the party in the 1930s and even claiming to have witnesses who would testify that they were traitors. Kang met with Nancy Tang and Wang Hairong, who were Mao's liaison to the politburo, and asked them to tell Mao. But the two women first met with Zhou Enlai. They told me that Zhou had warned them not to be rash, that while Mao had criticized his wife and her associates, he had no intention of striking them down. Kang was using the two women. If they had informed Mao of Kang Sheng's charges and Mao chose to protect his wife, Kang could deny having made the allegations. Nancy Tang and Wang Hairong would be the victims. They never told Mao.

Deng Xiaoping continued to tread lightly, claiming to follow Mao's instructions—study ideology and oppose revisionism, work for stability and unity, and improve the economy. But the attacks from Jiang Qing and her associates continued. Mao Yuanxin often served as their spokesman and warned the Chairman that Deng Xiaoping was attempting to negate the Cultural Revolution, that he never mentioned its accomplishments and rarely criticized the revisionist line of Liu Shaoqi. Wang Dongxing believed that under Mao Yuanxin's influence, Mao was becoming uneasy about Deng. Mao was easily persuaded of others' ill intent. That is why it was so important in any dispute to get to see him first. As Mao Yuanxin's influence over Mao grew, that of Nancy Tang and Wang Hairong declined. By September 1975, the two women had lost their special access to the Chairman, and Mao Yuanxin took over as Mao's liaison with the politburo. From then on, Deng Xiaoping was under continual attack, and the political situation grew increasingly tense.

Following our presentation to the politburo meeting in February, we had invited two more ophthalmologists to join the medical team—Tang Youzhi and Gao Peizhi, of Beijing's Guanganmen Hospital. The two doctors were trained in both Western and traditional Chinese medicine and could contribute to our deliberations about what technique would be best for Mao. The team of ophthalmologists was having difficulty deciding how to treat Mao's cataracts. The two doctors from Guanganmen Hospital recommended the less intrusive traditional Chinese method, which took only a few minutes and involved manipulation of a special needle, to push aside the turbid lens without removing it. Since this procedure was less of a shock to the system than the Western-style cataract removal, Tang and Gao preferred it.

I also favored the less intrusive technique, fearing potential complications of even a mild shock to Mao's system. The main objection of the Western-trained ophthalmologists was that the procedure would not actually remove Mao's turbid lens, so another procedure might be necessary in the future. They were less concerned than I about the possible effects of the Western technique on Mao's overall health.

The doctors were at an impasse. We decided to follow the politburo's advice and experiment on forty elderly cataract patients with heart problems. Officials of Beijing municipality found the patients, all of whom were elderly peasant men, without families, living in the countryside. They were in need of cataract surgery but were too poor to afford it. No one ever told them they were part of an experiment on behalf of the Chairman. We put them up in the General Office's guesthouse. Half the group would receive the traditional treatment and the other half would undergo the Western-style extraction. After the operations, we would submit a report to Mao, who would decide which type of procedure he preferred.

Mao was still in Hangzhou, under the care of Hu Xudong. Zhang Yufeng finally had had her way. Beaten down, Dr. Hu relented and began administering 800cc to 1000cc daily of a 5 percent glucose solution, to which he added a considerable dosage of steroids. But he was worried about the effect it would have on Mao and called both me and Wu Jie several times for consultation. I continued to object to the use of glucose, and since I was not in Hangzhou to observe and no blood or urine tests were being done to test the effects, neither I nor Wu Jie could offer any advice.

When he returned to Beijing in late April, Mao was still taking the glucose. I advised Hu Xudong to take a blood test and use the results to persuade Mao that he needed to stop the intravenous feedings. Wu Jie agreed. We were both afraid of possible complications if the glucose feedings went on too long.

Zhang Yufeng insisted on the infusions. Hu Xudong compromised by reducing the feedings to once every other day.

In mid-May, Zhang Yufeng read a report in Reference Materials that two Chinese doctors had successfully treated the heart disease of a high-ranking Romanian leader. She wanted the two doctors on our team. When Zhu Xianyi, the president of Tianjin Medical College, and Tao Huanle, from the department of internal medicine at Beijing Hospital, returned from Bucharest, I invited them to join us.

But the Romanian leader had been suffering from subacute bacterial endocarditis—a bacterial infection of the heart—and his disease had been cured with antibiotics. Mao's problems were different. The two new members of the team were no better able to advise us than the heart specialists we already had. But Mao wanted to meet them.

On June 10, I took the two men in to meet with the Chairman. As we entered the room, Zhang Yufeng and Mao were having an argument. Mao began gesticulating angrily when he saw us, but none of us could understand what he was saying. Only Zhang Yufeng knew that he was demanding that she explain why they were quarreling.

Two days earlier, Mao had become angry with Zhang Yufeng when he wanted her to read documents to him and she could not be found. When Zhang came back, Mao had scribbled on a piece of paper, “Zhang Yufeng, get out.”

Zhang had fought back, yelling that she would get out and cursing that if Mao did not let her go, he would become a dog. Mao was still furious. “I have a bad temper,” he said, “but Zhang's is even worse. She swore at me.”

Zhang complained that she did not know why the doctors had to hear the whole story, and the two doctors, meeting the Chairman for the first time, were dumbfounded. But Mao still wanted to hear about their treatment of the Romanian leader. The doctors assured the Chairman that his problems were completely different from the Romanian's, but Mao wanted them to join our team anyway.

When I encouraged the doctors to join us, they demurred. They were impressed with the quality of the doctors already serving Mao and thought we had enough doctors to set up a hospital. They had no additional contribution to make. Mao was already being served by the best physicians in China.

Wu Jie agreed. We already had enough experts. But I wanted Zhu Xianyi and Tao Huanle to stay. The more reputable doctors we had, the less the likelihood we could later be declared counterrevolutionary. But we had to maintain a united front. We had to consider our recommendations carefully and do all we could to reach unanimous conclusions. If Zhang Yufeng or Jiang Qing and her cronies ever heard we had differences, they could play us off against each other and accuse one side or the other of being counterrevolutionary. Many of the doctors were politically inexperienced and had no idea that disagreements among us could lead to later political attacks. Wu Jie did understand, however, and we worked together to convey our strategy to the team. The entire medical staff had to agree on Mao's treatment. If one or more doctors disagreed, we would discuss the issue further. But once the decision was made, we had to stand united. We added another member—Xu Delong, the director of neurology at Huashan Hospital in Shanghai, who had been conducting experimental treatments in Shanghai of patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.