Who were the Red Guards during the Cultural Revolution?

The Red Guards were groups of militant university and high school students who organized into paramilitary units during the Cultural Revolution (1966–76).1

Formed under the Chinese Communist Party in 1966, they were encouraged by party chairman Mao Zedong to combat "revisionist" authorities he believed were insufficiently revolutionary. While Mao sought to regain political control, the Red Guards—numbering up to 11 million—viewed themselves as revolutionary rebels dedicated to purging "bourgeois" elements and eliminating traditional culture.1

The movement was characterized by extreme violence and social disruption. Red Guard units persecuted intellectuals, teachers, and local officials, leading to hundreds of thousands of deaths. As factions began fighting each other for power and industrial production collapsed, the government intervened in 1967–68. The military was deployed to restore order, and the Red Guards were urged to relocate to the countryside, causing the movement to gradually subside.1