Commentary The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) celebrated the hundredth anniversary of its founding with an orgy of self-congratulation. Momentum was built for the several months preceding the date, with a daily release of posters of milestones in the Party’s history. A separate series of posters carried quotations from Xi Jinping carrying such unforgettable thoughts as “education is essential to the country and the Party” and “the absolute leadership of the Party over the military is a defining feature of Chinese socialism, and a major source of political strength to the Party and the state.” Unmentioned in all of these accounts of the glorious past were its historic failures, most especially the man-made famine of the Great Leap Forward and the destructive policies of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. Indeed, in the campaign against “historical nihilism,” meaning challenges to the official version of history, it can be dangerous to those who …