The 1930s and 1940s were a special period for our country, when the brutal Japanese army launched an invasion of our country and slaughtered our compatriots. It took fourteen years for our country to finally drive the Japanese out of China, and without external contradictions, war broke out again between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party.
After four years, our party, which won the hearts and minds of the people, defeated the corrupt National Government, and the war ended with Chiang Kai-shek's defeat and escape to Taiwan. In China's civil war, the People's Liberation Army marched all the way with absolute superiority and defeated chiang kai-shek's elite troops one after another, which meant that many of Chiang Kai-shek's subordinates were captured and imprisoned.
The first prisoners of war were granted amnesty by the state in 1959, and the first list of amnesty was all Kuomintang officers, except for Puyi and three other pseudo-Manchukuo war criminals. Once the amnesty list was issued, too many war criminals expressed displeasure, believing that they had met the conditions of the amnesty but had not been released, including Van Hanjay.
1. Disputes between prisoners of war
Fan Hanjie, like many senior Kuomintang officials, was reformed at the Gongdelin War Criminals Management Center in Beijing, but he was not on the first amnesty list. Fan Hanjie felt very unfair, because he had a positive attitude toward reform, and before he was captured, he was the deputy commander-in-chief of the Northeast Suppression Campaign, and like Du Yuming and others on the list, he was defeated and captured.
In fact, there is a reason why there is no Fan Hanjie in this first batch of amnesty lists, but we will talk about this issue later, first discuss the Kuomintang officers in the first batch of amnesty list, in addition to the good attitude of reform, what advantages they have before they can be released. First of all, wang Yaowu, among all the war criminals in the national army, his status can be said to be among the best, not only that, Wang Yaowu's reform attitude is the best.
In fact, Wang Yaowu himself did not support the civil war, but only as a subordinate obeyed Chiang Kai-shek's orders, and he did not have any hatred or hostility toward our party and our army, but only because of his different positions, he turned his sword against each other. After his defeat and capture, Wang Yaowu accepted the reality and studied a series of party ideas and policies in the war criminals management center, which he strongly agreed with, and it was precisely because of such a high level of consciousness that he appeared on the first list of amnesty.
2. Amnesty for prisoners of war who have their own advantages
Next came Du Yuming, who was also a big figure among prisoners of war; he was a backbone member of the Huangpu department within the Kuomintang, and he was a patriot himself. Another very important reason is that his son-in-law is the famous Nobel laureate Yang Zhenning, and with such a son-in-law who can win glory for the country, Du Yuming was successfully released.
The following person's attitude of reform is not good, but this is also blamed on his superior Fu Zuoyi, who was sitting in Beiping at that time, and he ordered Chen Changjie to stick to Tianjin and not give the PLA a chance. In this way, Chen Changjie carried out the orders of his superiors until he was defeated and captured, and did not choose to surrender. However, what he did not expect was that Fu Zuoyi chose peace talks, so that the People's Liberation Army liberated Peiping without a single soldier, which made Chen Changjie extremely dissatisfied, and Fu Zuoyi used his connections to win a amnesty quota for him in order to compensate this old subordinate.
Song Xilian was an officer of Chiang Kai-shek's concubine, a student of the first phase of the Whampoa Military Academy, and a close friend of General Chen Geng. After being captured, General Chen Geng visited him at the management office many times and told him that he must be well reformed, and Song Xilian himself was also very angry and had been actively reforming. In addition, he himself participated in less front-line combat and his charges were relatively light, so he was included in the list. The remaining first batch of amnesty personnel have their own advantages, and we will not list them all after careful consideration.
Third, return to society and become a new person
The reasons for the first batch of high-ranking Kuomintang officials who were pardoned were different, so let's go back to Fan Hanjie, why wasn't he on the first list? In 1933, Cai Tingkai led a plan to launch an armed uprising in Fujian against the corrupt rule of Chiang Kai's government. However, this matter was not known to fan Hanjie, and after fan Hanjie heard it, he felt that the opportunity for meritorious service had come, so he hurriedly reported it to Chiang Kai-shek.
Because of Fan Hanjie's whistle-blowing, the Fujian Uprising failed, and Cai Tingkai and several of his subordinates were forced into exile. Later, when discussing the first list of amnesty in China, Cai Tingkai happened to be one of the responsible persons, and when he saw Fan Hanjie's name, he resolutely refused to pardon Fan Hanjie. Fan Hanjie was at fault first, and Cai Tingkai's behavior was not unreasonable, so in order to take care of Cai Tingkai's feelings, the organization did not put Fan Hanjie on the first list of amnesty.
However, only a year later, Fan Hanjie was pardoned and released from prison for his good performance. Fan Hanjie, who returned to society, changed his mind and even became a commissioner of the Cultural and Historical Museum of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, and has been working for New China for the rest of his life. Not only him, but other pardoned war criminals have also undergone a fundamental transformation.
epilogue:
People are complex, and during the War of Resistance Against Japan, these war criminals were all patriotic generals who served the country. In the National Government, many of them were corrupt officials and bullies, but after reform, they all lived the lives of ordinary people, and even some of them joined the Communist Party and became part of the service of the people.