The Communist Manifesto was a one-party state under the rule of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU). Unlike their mass-based counterparts of the Second International, the CPSU and other Leninist parties like it in the Third International expected their members to know the classic works of Marx, Engels and Lenin. Further, party leaders were expected to base their policy decisions on Marxist-Leninist ideology. Therefore works such as the "Manifesto" were required reading for the party rank-and-file. Therefore the widespread dissemination of Marx and Engels' works became an important policy objective; backed by a sovereign state, the CPSU had relatively inexhaustible resources
The Christian Manifesto church's contributions are recognized. Gao, however, concedes that the manifesto "misled" Chinese Christians into thinking that they would be well-off with the new government. Foreign missionaries went as far as calling the manifesto "the failure of Christian conscience in China". Gao argues that the manifesto is not to be entirely blamed on Wu. Rather, it was "a product of a particular time – from 1948 to 1950 – that witnessed the victory of the CCP and the establishment of the PRC". Similarly, Bob Whyte argues the manifesto was appropriate in its historical setting, as "[t]he tide of history had left