00:00In 1958, Mao Zedong declared war on sparrows.
00:04Not metaphorically, literally.
00:06He ordered hundreds of millions of Chinese citizens to bang pots, drums, and cymbals
00:11without stopping until the birds dropped dead from exhaustion.
00:15And it worked.
00:16Within months, the sparrow was nearly wiped out across China.
00:20Then, something went wrong.
00:21Sparrows eat locusts.
00:23With the sparrows gone, locust populations exploded.
00:26Crops were devoured across the country.
00:28Fields that should have fed hundreds of millions produced almost nothing.
00:33What followed was the deadliest famine in recorded human history.
00:37Somewhere between 15 and 55 million people starved to death.
00:41The numbers are still disputed because Mao buried them.
00:44Officials who reported the death tolls were arrested.
00:47Grain continued to be exported to other countries while Chinese citizens ate bark and dirt and
00:52died in the streets.
00:53No drought caused this.
00:55No war.
00:56No disease.
00:56One man refused to be told he was wrong.
00:59And the state was built to make sure he never heard it.
01:02That silence killed more people than most wars ever have.
01:05No poison can be taught by the love.
01:05That silence will be told.
