Zhou Enlai

Zhou Enlai

Zhou Enlai < I > (March 5, 1898 - January 8, 1976) < / I >, with the word Xiangyu, formerly known as Feifei, Wuhao, Shaoshan, Guansheng, etc., was born in Huai'an, Jiangsu Province on March 5, 1898. He joined the Communist Party of China in 1921. He is a great Marxist, a great proletarian revolutionist, politician, militarist, diplomat, one of the main leaders of the party and the state, one of the main founders of the Chinese people's Liberation Army, and the founding father of the people's Republic of China. He is an important member of the first generation of central collective leadership with Comrade Mao Zedong as the core.

He died in Beijing on January 8, 1976. His death was widely mourned. He is known as "a good premier of the people" for his hard work, self-discipline and concern for the masses. His main works are collected in selected works of Zhou Enlai.

Life of the characters

Zhou Enlai, after graduating from Nankai school in Tianjin in 1917, went to Japan to study. He began to contact with Marxism, and his thought took an important turn.

He returned to China in 1919 and joined Nankai University in September. During the May 4th movement, he became the leader of Tianjin's student community and organized the progressive group awakening society together with other activists in the movement.

In 1920, he went to work study in Europe.

He joined the Communist Party of China in 1921, which strengthened his belief in communism. In 1922, he and Zhao Shiyan organized the Chinese Youth Communist Party in Europe (renamed the branch of the Chinese Socialist Youth League in Europe the next year). He served as secretary of the European branch of the Chinese Socialist Youth League and leader of the European branch of the Chinese Communist Party.

In 1923, he was appointed by the KMT headquarters as the preparatory member of the KMT Paris branch, the special commissioner and acting executive Minister of the KMT branch in Europe, and presided over the work of the KMT branch in Europe.

He returned to China in the autumn of 1924 and served as director of the Political Department of Huangpu Military Academy, director of the Political Department of the first army of the National Revolutionary Army and deputy party representative of the first army during the period of cooperation between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party of China. He successively served as chairman, standing member and military Minister of the Guangdong Regional Committee of the Communist Party of China. He twice participated in the eastern expedition against warlord Chen Jiongming and created an effective military political work system.

In March 1927, when the national revolutionary army of the northern expedition was close to Shanghai, it led the Shanghai workers in the third armed uprising and drove away the Northern Warlords stationed in Shanghai. In May of the same year, he was elected as a member of the Central Committee at the Fifth National Congress of the Communist Party of China and a member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee at the first plenary session of the Fifth Central Committee of the Communist Party of China. On July 12, the CPC Central Committee was reorganized, and he served as a member of the provisional Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee. After the collapse of the KMT communist cooperation, he, together with he long, Ye Ting, Zhu De and Liu Bocheng, led an armed uprising in Nanchang, Jiangxi Province on August 1 and served as secretary of the former enemy Committee of the CPC.

In 1928, he was elected as a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee at the first plenary session of the sixth CPC Central Committee. He later served as the head of the Organization Department of the CPC Central Committee and Secretary of the Central Military Commission. In order to ensure the security of the secret work of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China in Shanghai, to contact and guide the armed struggle led by the Communist Party of China in various regions, and to develop the secret work in the Kuomintang ruled areas, it played an important role. For most of this stage, he was actually the main leader of the CPC Central Committee.

In December 1931, he left Shanghai and went to the central revolutionary base. He successively served as secretary of the Central Bureau of the Central Soviet Area, general political commissar of the Chinese workers' and peasants' Red Army, general political commissar of the first front army, and vice chairman of the Central Revolutionary Military Commission.

In the spring of 1933, together with Zhu De, he led and directed the Red Army to defeat the fourth "encirclement and suppression" of the Kuomintang army against the central revolutionary base.

He took part in the long march in October 1934.

At the enlarged meeting of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee held in Zunyi, Guizhou Province in January 1935, he supported Mao Zedong's correct ideas, played a key role in establishing the correct leadership of the new Central Committee represented by Mao Zedong, and continued to be elected as one of the main military leaders of the Central Committee.

In December 1936, after Zhang Xueliang and Yang Hucheng launched the "Xi'an Incident" in which Chiang Kai Shek was detained by force, they served as the Plenipotentiary of the Communist Party of China, went to Xi'an to negotiate with Chiang Kai Shek with Qin bangxian and Ye Jianying, and together with Zhang and Yang forced Chiang Kai Shek to accept the idea of "stopping the civil war and resisting Japan together", thus promoting the formation of a united Anti Japanese situation.

During the Anti Japanese War, he represented the Communist Party of China to do the United Front Work in Chongqing and other areas controlled by the Kuomintang for a long time, and tried to unite all the forces advocating Anti Japanese and national salvation, and successively led the work of the Yangtze River Bureau and the Southern Bureau of the CPC Central Committee. He insisted on the cooperation between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party, actively united the democratic parties, progressive intellectuals, patriots and international friends, stopped the anti Communist countercurrent and overcame the danger of surrendering to Japan.

At the first plenary session of the Seventh Central Committee of the Communist Party of China in 1945, he was elected member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee, Secretary of the Central Secretariat, and Mao Zedong, Zhu De, Liu Shaoqi, and Ren Bishi formed the Secretariat of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China headed by Mao Zedong. After the victory of the Anti Japanese War, in order to stop the civil war, the CPC delegation negotiated with the Kuomintang and led the party's work, military work and United Front Work in the Kuomintang ruled area.

After 1946, he served as vice chairman of the Central Military Commission of the Communist Party of China and acting chief of the general staff, assisting Mao Zedong in organizing and directing the war of liberation, and guiding the revolutionary movement in the Kuomintang ruled areas.

Since the founding of the people's Republic of China, Zhou Enlai has been the Prime Minister of the government. He was also the foreign minister from 1949 to 1958. He was elected member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the eighth, ninth and tenth CPC Central Committee, vice chairman of the eighth and tenth CPC Central Committee, and vice chairman of the Central Military Commission. He was also the first vice chairman and the second, third and fourth chairman of the CPPCC National Committee. It shoulders the heavy task of dealing with the daily work of the party and the state.

From 1949 to 1952, he successfully organized and led the recovery of the national economy. By the end of 1952, the total output value of industry and agriculture in China had reached the highest level in history.

During the first five year plan period from 1953 to 1957, he led the industrial construction centering on 156 construction projects, which laid a preliminary foundation for China's industrialization. In 1954, he put forward the four modernizations goal of building modern industry, agriculture, transportation and national defense, organized and formulated the scientific development plan for 1956-1967, and promoted the rapid development of national science and technology.

From 1961 to 1965, in order to correct the mistakes brought about by the great leap forward and reverse the difficult economic situation, he, Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping led the adjustment of the national economy and gradually restored and developed the national economy. He stressed that the key to building a strong socialist country lies in the realization of scientific and technological modernization, and advocated that economic construction must be practical and realistic, proceed from China's actual conditions, be positive, steady, and comprehensively balanced. He paid special attention to water conservancy construction and the development of national defense science and technology, and made great contributions to it. He also paid special attention to the work of the United Front, the work of intellectuals, the work of culture and the modernization of the people's army in the socialist period, and made important achievements in guiding these work.

He was involved in making and personally implementing major foreign policy decisions. When the Korean War broke out in 1950, he assisted Mao Zedong in commanding the operations of the Chinese people's Volunteer Army, took charge of the organization of logistical support, and led the armistice negotiations of the Chinese delegation.

In 1954, he led the Chinese delegation to the Geneva Conference and reached an agreement through negotiation, which made the independence of Vietnam (except the South), Laos and Cambodia internationally recognized. On behalf of the Chinese government, he proposed the five principles of peaceful coexistence as the norms of state to state relations.

At the Bandung Conference in 1955, he advocated peaceful coexistence, opposed colonialism, and advocated seeking common ground while reserving differences and reaching consensus through consultation, thus actively implementing China's independent foreign policy of peace. He has visited dozens of countries in Asia, Africa and Europe, and received a large number of leaders and friendly personages from all over the world. He has made important contributions to enhancing the friendship between the Chinese people and the people of the world and expanding China's international influence.

During the "Cultural Revolution", he made unremitting efforts to minimize the losses caused by the "Cultural Revolution", to enable the party and the state to carry out many necessary work, to maintain the national economic construction, to protect a large number of leading cadres and democratic personages, and to restore and implement the policies of the party and the state. He fought with Lin Biao and Jiangqing groups in various forms, and played an important role in controlling and stabilizing the situation in defeating various separatist and power grabbing conspiracies of Lin Biao and Jiangqing groups. He has made outstanding contributions to opening up a new diplomatic situation, realizing Sino US detente, normalizing Sino Japanese relations and restoring China's seat in the United Nations.

After he was diagnosed with bladder cancer in 1972, he continued to work. At the first session of the Fourth National People's Congress in 1975, on behalf of the Communist Party of China, he put forward again the goal of realizing the modernization of industry, agriculture, national defense and science and technology in China, which encouraged the people's confidence in overcoming difficulties.

He died in Beijing on January 8, 1976. His death was widely mourned. He is known as "a good premier of the people" for his hard work, self-discipline and concern for the masses. Around the Qingming Festival in April 1976, a large number of Party members, workers, students, cadres and even soldiers and farmers held spontaneous rallies in Tiananmen Square in Beijing to commemorate him and oppose the gang of four, which was still in power at that time. It was known as the "Tiananmen Square incident", and developed into a nationwide protest movement against the counter revolutionary group of Jiangqing. It was founded by the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee in January 1976 In October, it smashed the Jiangqing counter revolutionary group and laid a mass foundation.

Character works

His main works are collected in selected works of Zhou Enlai.

Main contributions

During the period of the new democratic revolution, Comrade Zhou Enlai created a new era for the Communist Party of China

Chinese PinYin : Zhou En Lai