ABSTRACT
British analysts in the 1960s created a series of reports exploring many different aspects of the Cultural Revolution in China, including an array of second- and third-order effects, along with their implications for society as a whole. The breadth of their analysis and the prescience of their foresight was remarkable, due in part to their ability to recreate the historical consciousness of Mao and his generation, even in the absence of sufficient intelligence sources. In the months before the opening salvos of the revolution, they were able to depict a looming succession crisis that would pit the legacy of an older generation of Communist Party stalwarts against the expectations of a younger generation.
