ideology, the Chinese people found hope in a New China, wherein citizens would always have a bowl of rice to eat and clothes to wear. Mao proved to be good at fighting but poor at governing. He pushed sweeping socio-economic initiatives and strident ideological campaigns, often with disastrous results. During two political campaigns in the late 1950s, over 550,000 rightist intellectuals were persecuted and imprisoned. The Great Leap Forward led to widespread famine and the deaths of an estimated 30 million Chinese. In the late 1960s, Mao would again stand in the Tiananmen rostrum to launch the Cultural Revolution. There, he rallied hundreds of thousands of young Chinese -- the radical Red Guards -- who lionized him like a demi-god. To rebel is justified ! they proclaimed. They rebelled against everything and wreaked havoc everywhere. For ten years, China was condemned to political turmoil and economic malaise. Perhaps the only factor that kept the country from total collapse was the people's incomparable resilience and their ability to chi ku -LRB- eat bitterness, or bear hardship -RRB-. Mao's reign is also credited for positive changes. He banned child brides and polygamy, built Beijing's first subway line and started a space program with China's first satellite launch. In 1972, the People's Republic of China replaced the Republic of China -LRB- Taiwan -RRB- in the United