The famine provoked factional struggles within the CPC. Mao used dictatorial methods to suppress the Peng Dehuai faction which pleaded on behalf of the people, but the ascendancy of the Liu-Deng pragmatist faction gave Mao an uneasy sense that he would lose his supremacy. Therefore he joined forces with Lin Biao and by a rapid series of actions, used his status to whip up an "anti-revisionist" struggle within China.
大饑荒引起中共內部鬥爭，毛以專制手段鎮壓了為民請命的彭德懷一派，但劉鄧務實派的當權，令毛有失勢的不安與預感，於是，他聯合林彪以他的權威地位，步步緊追地策動了國內的「反修」鬥爭。