The Radio School of the Central Revolutionary Military Commission was born in Changting
□ Huang Qiyuan
During the period of the Second Civil Revolutionary War, Changting was the core area of the Central Soviet Region, the economic and cultural center of the Central Soviet District, the seat of the Fujian Provincial Party Committee, the Provincial Soviet Government and the Provincial Military District, the political, military, economic and cultural center of the Fujian Revolutionary Movement, known as "Little Red Shanghai", and "the hometown of the Red Army, the place where the red land and the red flag do not fall". Mao Zedong, Liu Shaoqi, Zhu De, Zhou Enlai and other proletarian revolutionaries of the older generation all practiced great revolutionary practice here.
Old photo of Changting Shuidong Street
The Radio School of the Central Revolutionary Military Commission was born in Changting
In June 1930, the Red Fourth Army, the Red Third Army, and the Red Twelfth Army were formally reorganized into the Red First Army in Changting, and the combat form of the Red Army has since changed, from guerrilla warfare to mainly mobile warfare.
In September 1930, when Peng Dehuai's troops attacked Changsha, they were separated from Huang Gongluo's troops by only one railway, but they could not communicate with each other. From then on, the top brass of the Red Army felt that it was necessary to establish radio communications. To this end, Mao Zedong and Zhu De repeatedly ordered that the seized "radio machines should not be destroyed, and the entire machine and radio operators and operators must be collected."
In the first half of 1931, the Red Army held two radio training courses and began to train its own radio communication talents.
In November 1931, the Communist Party of China established the Provisional Central Government of the Chinese Soviet Republic in Ruijin, Jiangxi. With the needs of the development of the revolutionary situation, the use of radio communications is very important and urgent in communicating the links between the Central Government and the Central Committee of the Shanghai Party and the Soviet governments of the provinces, between the Central Revolutionary Military Commission and the armies and corps of all sides, and between the corps. However, the Red Army's radio talents are extremely scarce. The training method of training radio technicians with military classes without a fixed place and no stable environment is far from being able to meet the needs of all units of the Red Army, so the Central Revolutionary Military Commission decided to establish a Red Army radio school to vigorously cultivate talents. For the choice of school site, Mao Zedong and Zhu De agreed with each other, and they chose Tingzhou City, the most prosperous city in the Central Soviet District and the first city in Red China.
At the Roche Ancestral Hall, less than 500 meters from the former site of the Soviet government in Fujian Province, hangs an already mottled wooden plank that reads "Former Site of the Red Army Radio School."
On September 11, 1931, the 12th Army of the Red First Army, together with the New 12th Army of the Local Red Army in Western Fujian, once again conquered Tingzhou, connecting the Western Fujian Soviet District and the Gannan Soviet District. Subsequently, the CPC Fujian-Guangdong-Gansu Special Committee and the Western Fujian Soviet Government moved from Yongding Hugang to Tingzhou. In October, in order to strengthen the leadership of the revolutionary struggle, with the approval of the Fujian-Guangdong-Gansu Special Committee, the Tingzhou Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China was established. With the approval of the Western Fujian Soviet Government, the Tingzhou Municipal Soviet Government was established. Tingzhou is a municipality directly under the Fujian Provincial Soviet Government, which administers five districts, including the eastern suburbs, the western suburbs, the southern suburbs, the northern suburbs, and the center, with a total population of about 30,000 people.
In November 1931, the Red Army opened the third Red Army radio training course (1931.11-1932.04) in Huangzhai, Jianli Lane, Shuidong Street, Changting City. At the end of the month, the Central Revolutionary Military Commission upgraded it to the Central Revolutionary Military Commission Radio School. Principal Liu Guangfu, Political Commissar Yang Lanshi (later Zeng San), Academic Affairs Director Shen Yili, and faculty members include Chen Shiwu, Wei Mingdao, Huang Lotte, Yang Xiaoshi, Li Zhunan, etc. There were 36 students, including Zhong Fuxiang (Zhong Fuxiang), Li Jingrui, Qian Jiang (Qian Changxin), Huang Liangcheng (Huang Zikun), Xiao Sen, Zhao Binyu (Binyu), Wu Xisheng, Li Wentong, Tang Taode (Tang Ming), Feng Yunqin, Huang Zhiwen, Huang Rong, Tian Baohong, Chen Mingxin, Qiu Junpin, Li Xingli, Lei Yongtong, Liu Shiqing, and Peng Kang, which was the largest enrollment in the Central Soviet Region.
The Radio School of the Central Revolutionary Military Commission strictly follows the militarized management and organizes the cadets into a platoon, with Zhong Fuxiang as the platoon leader. On the day of the establishment of the school, accompanied by Guo Huaruo, secretary general of the Provisional General Front Committee of the Red Army and chief of staff, Mao Zedong and Zhu De came to the school to visit all the teachers and students of the school, and the two also spoke to encourage all the trainees to study hard, to be a good "clairvoyant and tailwind ear" of the Red Army, and to make contributions to the revolution. Mao Zedong said: "With radio communications, the troops can spread out and gather together." Because of the existence of radio, even in the rural environment, we are not isolated politically, and we are closely related to the political activities of the whole country and the whole world. At the same time, even if the revolution is divided in the various villages, it can be guided by radio. ”
Radio equipment used by Red Army soldiers during the Soviet period
In the smoke of the war, the first radio school of the people's army, the Radio School of the Central Revolutionary Military Commission, was born in Changting.
Due to the enemy's blockade and encirclement, there were no teaching materials in the school at that time, and there were few buzzers and hand keys. How to solve the problem of no teaching materials? In May 1986, Shen Yili, the academic director at that time, recalled: "In order to ensure teaching and solve the problem of teaching materials, I gathered the notification procedures and service language, thought about a part, wrote a part, taught a part, and wrote a lecture note mimeographed out and sent it to the students." ”
Soon, the Central Revolutionary Military Commission transferred a group of comrades engaged in radio work from the Ningdu uprising troops to the school to enrich the teaching staff, and after repeated revisions and supplements, they had decent teaching materials.
The first batch of cadets in the school were all selected and transferred from various units of the Red Army, and their educational levels were uneven. According to this situation, the school adopts a separate approach to teaching. Uneducated students learn to read first, and after 3 months of study, they learn radio or aircraft maintenance courses. Students with a certain cultural foundation begin to learn technical courses from the beginning. After the trainees have basically mastered the technology, they will add courses such as foreign languages, service language, and notification procedures, and the semester will be 6 months. Due to the urgent needs of the revolutionary war, the trainees have indicators for study, and after examination, they graduate on time if they meet the requirements, graduate early if they meet the requirements, and continue to study until they study well. In December of the same year, Zhou Enlai, then secretary of the Central Bureau, came to Changting and personally taught the students a lesson on how to compile passwords. Among the trainees in this period, many of them are important leaders and backbones in the field of communications and technical reconnaissance in the future, such as Zhong Fuxiang, Qian Jiang, Xiao Sen, Zhao Binyu, Tang Taode, Huang Rong, Li Xinglu, lei Yongtong, and so on.
Group photo of Red Army radio workers
According to Shen Yili's recollection: "In November 1931, the Red Army opened the third radio training class in Changting, Fujian Province, and I began to engage in academic affairs work and served as the director of academic affairs. Before that, in 1928, I was admitted to the radio school run by the Sixth Radio Station of the Kuomintang Traffic Department to study newspaper service, which was located in Laoximen, Shanghai. After graduation, he was assigned to the sixth station as an apprentice, and soon after he was transferred to the second station of the Kuomintang government in Nanjing as a telegraph operator, and later to the Seventeenth Military Radio of the Kuomintang, where he was still a telegraph operator. From here, he was transferred to work on the radio station of the Twenty-eighth Division of the Kuomintang Army, which was a 100W radio. In May 1931, the division was wiped out by the Red Army in the Donggu area of Jiangxi, and Gongbingfan fled. A chief of the Red Army came to collect the radio, and after inquiring about the radio, he said: We, the General Political Commissar of Mao, welcome you technicians to join the Red Army, and you should join us in the revolution. Since then, I have joined the Red Army together with radio personnel Xu Jinrong, Lin Zhuoran, Yang Jingchun, Huang Qingjiu, and others. In addition to a 100W radio, we brought a lot of communication equipment and a batch of 6V batteries. With this radio, together with the capture of the news machine captured by Zhang Huizhan's division and the 15W radio station captured by Tan Daoyuan's division, the Red Army could inform each other. Within our army, when I first joined the Red Army, a radio brigade had already been set up at the headquarters, with Comrade Wang Yi as the captain and Comrade Feng Wenbin as the political commissar. Commander-in-Chief Zhu and General Political Commissar Mao, the leaders of the Red Army, were very concerned about the work of the radio. They often went to the radio, inquired about the situation, meticulously did ideological work for us, and explained the revolutionary principles in layman's terms, and we listened very eye-openingly. Coupled with the fact that we often participated in political studies in the Red Army, listened to leading comrades give us reports, and preached Marxism-Leninism, we comrades who had recently joined the Red Army quickly stabilized our mood and strengthened our revolutionary convictions. ”
Due to the continuous victory of the Red Army, coupled with the large amount of communication equipment brought by the uprising of the Twenty-sixth Route Army, the troops were equipped with more radio stations, and more radio technicians needed to be trained, and there were more cadets in each period than in the first period.
The cadet certificate of the Red Army Radio Study Class that year
In the first, second, and third revolutionary war against "encirclement and suppression" in the Central Soviet Region, the Red Army, starting from half of the captured radio stations and the captured telegraph operators, established its own radio communications team, and these telecommunications personnel gave full play to the role of "clairvoyance and tailwind ears" and repeatedly made great achievements in the struggle against the enemy. With radio communications, the Red Army has gained wings like a tiger, its combat effectiveness has been significantly enhanced, and it has played an important role in supporting military operations and political struggles. Mao Zedong spoke highly of the fact that with radio communications, the Red Army would be more flexible in moving from the inner line to the outer line of combat, and the troops would be more able to spread out and gather together.
Renamed "Red Army Radiocommunication School"
Radio communication was undoubtedly the highest technology at that time, so the training of radio communication talents became the top secret of the Red Army, and the Central Revolutionary Military Commission considered from the perspective of secrecy, during the Red Army's attack on Ganzhou, in mid-February 1932, the school was secretly moved from Changting to Ruijin Yangxi Village. Soon, the school was renamed the "Red Army Radiocommunication School".
Chairman Mao Zedong's inscription
With the universal establishment and rapid development of radio communications, radio communications have become an important means of communication for the Party Central Committee and the Central Revolutionary Military Commission.
In April 1933, the sixth phase of the Red Army Radiocommunication School was opened, with a total of more than 300 students, plus nearly a thousand teaching staff. In addition to the radio training team, a cable power team, a division number team, a flag team, etc. have been added, and the person in charge of the cable power team is Li Yukui.
In July 1934, the Red Army Radio Communication School also held an advanced class, with Zhu Xuzhi, Zheng Zhizhong, Huang Rong, Huang Ping, and Zhong Fuxiang. In October, the senior class was successively assigned to work along the Long March, the main force of the Central Red Army.
From November 1931 to October 1934, the Red Army Radio Communication School successively trained more than 2,000 communication personnel in various types such as telegraphy, aircraft maintenance, telephone, division number, and banner, and most of these cadets were assigned to the communication detachments at all levels of the Red Army, and a small number of cadets were transported to the Soviet areas of Eyuwan, Xiang'exi, and Xiang'egan. Although the number of these red "wind listeners" is small, their role is comparable to that of thousands of troops and horses, and they have made countless meritorious achievements and created many legends in the Long March, the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, the War of Liberation, and the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea.
The development and growth of radio communication schools
In October 1934, the main force of the Central Red Army began to withdraw from the Central Soviet Area, implementing a strategic transfer, and the school also embarked on the journey with the troops.
According to Shen Yili's recollection: "During the Long March of the troops, the general school was changed to a teaching brigade, the leadership personnel remained unchanged, the principal Liu Guangfu was changed to the captain of the brigade, and I was still the director of academic affairs. While marching, while attending classes, the rest time is long, and the class time is correspondingly long, and when you arrive at the camp, you can make up for the delayed classes on the road, sometimes for an hour or two. Despite the arduous environment of the marching operations, we also seized the time to consolidate and improve the technical level of the cadets. On June 12, 1935, the Red Army and the Red Fourth Front met in the Davi Victory Division in the Maogong area. In August, our teaching brigade merged with the Radio Training Class of the Red Fourth Front, and in a place in Daofu, Sichuan, we reverted to the name of the Red Army Communication School, which was taught by Comrade Liu Yin and me. ”
In 1932, the former site of ruijin Yangxi village of the Central Military Commission Radio School
In October 1936, the three main Red Army forces of the First, Second and Fourth Fronts met in victory in northern Shaanxi. In December, the communication school went to Wayao Fort and merged with the radio school in northern Shaanxi, and the school was renamed "Central Military Commission Radio Communication School", with principal Wu Zeguang, political commissar Zeng San, and Shen Yili still serving as the director of academic affairs. The school was located in Jiugoutai, Wayao Fort, and later moved to the area of Peizhuang in Yan'an, and later to Yunyang Town in Sanyuan.
During the long war years, the Red Army's telecommunications teaching work has created and accumulated a lot of valuable experience: First, the purpose of teaching should be clear, teaching and learning should be closely integrated, and the content of teaching materials should be concise and practical; second, teaching theory should be closely integrated with teaching practice, not only teaching book knowledge, but also penetrating practical experience, combining model teaching, and improving the level of practical operation; third, combining classroom study with after-class review, in addition to lecturing, it is also necessary to patiently counsel and teach according to the person. Under the leadership of their superiors, through the efforts of the teachers, students, and staff of the whole school, the Red Army Communications School has continuously summed up experience and improved teaching methods under extremely difficult conditions, trained a large number of radio technicians for our army, and made its own contribution to winning the victory in the revolutionary war.
In May 1948, the school moved to Hebei Province, and was renamed "North China Military Region Telecommunications Engineering College". In October 1949, the school moved to Zhangjiakou, Hebei Province, and was renamed "Engineering School of the People's Revolutionary Military Committee of the Central People's Government"; in May 1952, the school was renamed "Chinese People's Liberation Army Communication Engineering College"; in January 1955, the school was renamed "Chinese People's Liberation Army Military Communication Engineering College"; in August 1955, the school was renamed "Chinese People's Liberation Army Communication College". In January 1958, it was moved to Xi'an, Shaanxi Province and renamed as "Chinese People's Liberation Army Signal Corps College"; in January 1960, the school was renamed "Chinese People's Liberation Army Military Telecommunications Engineering College"; in April 1964, the school was renamed "Northwest Telecommunications Engineering College"; since January 1988, the school has been named "Xidian University", becoming a national key university with information and electronic disciplines as the mainstay, and establishing immortal merits for the creation and development of the national electronics industry. (The author's affiliation is the Research Office of Party History and Local History of the Changting County Committee of the Communist Party of China.) ）