Mao died in 1976. Following a brief power struggle, Peng's former ally, Deng Xiaoping, emerged as the paramount leader of China. One of Deng's first political goals was to rehabilitate party members who had been condemned and persecuted during the Cultural Revolution. By 1978, many people, led by General Huang Kecheng, who had been a comrade of Peng's since Peng rebelled against the Kuomintang in 1928, were agitating for Peng's posthumous rehabilitation. The Chinese government formally reversed the "erroneous" verdict of Peng during the Third Plenum of the Eleventh CPC Central Committee, held from December 18 to 22, 1978. Deng gave a speech announcing Peng's rehabilitation: