Oh embargo, the usual scapegoat for the inherent failure of tankie policies. The collectivisation which removed experienced farmers to work on lands, along with Lysenko's deliberate ignoring of established agricultural science in exchange to his whatever supposedly science he conjured up with, led to the worst famine since the Irish Famine. Mao was told not to order to kill sparrows because they hunt rats and locusts, pests that have worse effect on agriculture.
Least obvious PR tankie answer.
