The year 2024 marks the 70th anniversary of the founding of the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps. Since last year, the author has continuously led the Cultural Runjiang Volunteer Service Group to the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps to carry out the "Cultural Runjiang" activity, and went there with great pride, but the heart has become weaker and weaker every time: the culture of the Corps is actually very advanced, and all aspects of the work of the Corps have been ahead of the curve, insisting on what should be adhered to, developing what should be developed, and avoiding unnecessary stone manipulation. The XPCC should set up its own advanced experience propaganda group and go to various parts of the motherland.
It is necessary to make up historical knowledge with readers and friends.
In February 1952, Chairman Mao Zedong issued an order for the reorganization of the troops: "You can now save the weapons of battle and take up the weapons of production and construction." When the Motherland needs to summon you, I will command you to take up the arms of battle again and defend the Motherland. "After the founding of the People's Republic of China, the People's Liberation Army in Xinjiang was faced with the problem of how to resettle the remnants of the Kuomintang and local illegal armed forces after it completed the elimination of the remnants of the Kuomintang and local illegal armed forces. On October 7, 1954, the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps was formally established, and the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and Chairman Mao ordered 105,000 officers and soldiers stationed in Xinjiang, including their families, to collectively transfer to work on the spot to form the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps. Since then, the XPCC has continuously replenished demobilized officers and men, as well as 100,000 border educated youths from Henan, Hubei, Beijing, Shanghai, Tianjin, and other places, to form a corps that is unique in the world in terms of production and construction with a militarized structure. By October 2004, the XPCC had developed into China's largest agricultural, industrial and commercial economic complex with 14 agricultural divisions and bureaus, 174 agricultural and animal husbandry regiments and farms, more than 5,000 enterprises and more than 2.5 million people. This is the first division of the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps in early 1960 to enter the Tarim Basin to reclaim the barren Gobi Desert.
There is no doubt that the establishment of the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps is an outstanding creation of the first generation of the leading collective of New China, and the successful case of combining the two is a feat built on the four self-confident foundations of system, theory, road, and culture.
Semi-military management in Xinjiang has been adopted for a long time, more than 2,000 years ago in the Western Han Dynasty set up the Western Regions Protectorate (60 BC), exercising the direct jurisdiction of the central power over this region, the Tang Dynasty strengthened the management, set up the North Garden, West Garden, South Courtyard Protectorate, and later Zuo Zongtang carried the coffin under Xinjiang, the 359th Brigade reclaimed the border, and the Hunan Nu Lu Mei supported the magnificent past of Xinjiang. Since the founding of the People's Republic of China, the central government has always attached great importance to the prosperity and development of Xinjiang. In particular, in the past decade or so, the central government has convened two forums on Xinjiang work, held in Beijing on May 17, 2010 and May 28, 2014, so that the people of the whole country have always cast their eyes, enthusiasm and hope together on this vast western region and the beautiful Xinjiang, which accounts for one-sixth of the country's territory. It can be said that the establishment and good operation of the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps is a great achievement of the CPC leading the Chinese people to integrate Marxism and Mao Zedong Thought with the practice of the Chinese revolution and with the excellent traditional culture.
Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, the central government has given overall consideration to the work of the Xinjiang local government and the Production and Construction Corps. The XPCC has its strengths and weaknesses, and localities also have its own shortcomings and advantages, and there are some problems that need to be solved in the same hot land, and how each can give full play to its potential and help and support each other at the necessary moment. In 2022 and 2023, specific measures will be introduced to promote the work of cultural revitalization of Xinjiang by the member units of the subordinate groups of the China Federation of Literary and Art Circles. In 2018, the Chinese People's Association dug deep into the historical and cultural resources of the XPCC, combined with the actual needs, and overcame public opinion, and established the "Hometown of Chinese Military Reclamation Culture" in the Seventh Division of the XPCC. In 2023, the Chinese People's Association will set up a "Cultural Runjiang Workstation" in the XPCC Federation of Literary and Art Circles. The work of cultural revitalization of Xinjiang is embarking on a new journey of institutionalization, standardization and normalization.
The XPCC spirit is an important part of the spiritual pedigree of the Communist Party of China. General Secretary Xi Jinping defined the XPCC spirit as "loving the motherland, selfless dedication, hard work, and pioneering spirit". Loving the motherland is the core of the XPCC spirit and the belief and code of conduct of XPCC members. The XPCC people have their own spiritual bloodline: "Born in Jinggang Mountain, grew up in Nanniwan, spanned tens of millions of miles, and rooted in the Tianshan Mountains." "After the end of the war, in accordance with the strategic deployment of the Party Central Committee, the 100,000-strong army laid down its arms, picked up its hoe, and began another battle on the thousand-mile Gobi Desert. Every time I come to the Corps and hear the story of the "Hunan Girl Lu Mei" of the Corps, we are deeply shocked. A singing artist, who has been pursuing true love for decades but can't, listened to the story of 8,000 Hunan women going down to the Tianshan Mountain, and looked at the bright smiling faces of youth in the exhibition hall, and was moved to tears. She said: It turns out that this is also love, integrating the ego into the great cause of stabilizing the frontier, dedicating true love to the children of workers and peasants rooted in the frontier, sleeping in the ground, drinking saline water, and doing the same work as male soldiers, you can also feel happy and happy.
Pioneering and enterprising is the intrinsic requirement of the XPCC spirit. The work of the XPCC itself is the result of pioneering and enterprising, and it is a great creation that shakes the earth. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, the XPCC people continued to regard the pioneering spirit as the soul of all undertakings. The earliest large-scale iron and steel plant in New China, the Bayi Iron and Steel Plant, and the earliest large-scale oil field, the Karamay Oilfield, are the masterpieces of the XPCC people. On June 22, 2024, I arrived at the 7th Division of the Corps, just in time for the news network to report the news of the first-ever winter wheat harvest in Makati County. The wheat grown on the salt flats is an eternal anecdote. This is a miracle on earth created by the people of the Corps. This reminds me of June 14, 2023, at Hongqi Farm in Tumshuk City, the Third Division of the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, I saw a marine aquaculture farm deep in the desert.
It is unbelievable that marine aquaculture can be carried out in the depths of the desert, but it is true, and I have seen it with my own eyes. This farm was established in 1958. The topography here is predominantly hilly and saline. Over the past 60 years since its founding, several generations of XPCC workers have been fighting for heaven and earth, trying to transform thousands of miles of saline-alkali land into productive farmland. But the result is not good. There are more than a dozen regiment-level units under the Third Division, and the economic benefits of this farm are at the bottom. In 2020, Zhong Lingfeng, a personnel cadre of Tarim University, came here to be the political commissar, and after repeated investigation and research and scientific demonstration, he agreed that to truly change the backward appearance of Hongqi Farm, it is necessary to change the way of thinking and find a new law. Hundreds of millions of years ago, it was a vast ocean, but after violent crustal movements, it became today's saline-alkali land. In the farm area, there are hundreds of square kilometers of saline land, as well as gushing mountain springs. The mountain springs here are salty, as if a huge ocean is hidden underground. Zhong Lingfeng said that since this was once the sea, let's let it be the sea again. Engaging in marine aquaculture must be more profitable than growing food crops.
This idea is a bit like the story of Dayu's water control. Change the blockage into sparseness, and take on a new look. Instead of confronting nature, it is better to skillfully use the laws of nature and push the boat with the water. After experiments, mariculture was a success. The seawater mountain spring, which was originally avoided not far away, has now become a treasure, and it has been channeled to a dredged depression to make an artificial ocean. In order to avoid freezing the artificial ocean through the harsh winter cold, they built a huge greenhouse with a constant temperature throughout the four seasons, and used oversized fish tanks for marine aquaculture. Automatic temperature adjustment, automatic oxygen supply, automatic feeding of bait. A greenhouse with 9 large fish tanks can pay back in one year. It is at the very core of the continent and is the farthest inland from the ocean. In the past, seafood had to be shipped by air, and more than half of the price of seafood was transportation fees. Nowadays, seafood can be eaten locally, and the price advantage is very obvious.
The success of marine aquaculture at Hongqi Farm was soon replicated in other places in Xinjiang with similar conditions. It used to be the farthest inland area from the ocean, but now it is a global focus for mariculture.
The Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps has always put cultural construction in an important position to lay out and consider. The Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps Folk Artists Association was established in March 2005, which is not an earlier association. However, in a short period of 18 years, under the leadership of the party group and association of the XPCC Federation of Literary and Art Circles, and the cultural and propaganda departments of divisions and regiments, more than 367 members at all levels have been developed, including more than 147 members of the Chinese People's Association, and positive efforts have been made in prospering the creation of military reclamation and folk literature, excavating the cultural resources of the XPCC, cultivating literary and artistic talents, giving full play to the cohesion of culture in Xinjiang, and jointly building a beautiful home for multi-ethnic unity and cooperation. Adhering to the bloodline of China's reclamation culture over the past 2,000 years, the XPCC culture brings together the essence of the Western Regions culture, the Central Plains culture, the nomadic culture, the farming culture, the military culture and the excellent culture of various ethnic groups in Xinjiang. This is an extremely valuable cultural treasure house, and protecting, inheriting, and making good use of the culture of military reclamation is an important starting point and glorious mission for the cultural construction of the XPCC.
Generally speaking, the XPCC culture with the XPCC spirit as the core is a new model of the new socialist culture with Chinese characteristics under the leadership of the Party. Integrating traditional culture, revolutionary culture, and the culture of reform and opening up, her background color is red, and she is a treasure house of red culture that grew up on the hot soil dyed red by countless revolutionary martyrs. Over the past 70 years, the XPCC has become increasingly advanced in culture, which is embodied in the following aspects:
First, uphold the party's leadership and retain the characteristics of military reclamation. The XPCC culture has always been a red culture under the leadership of the party, and it is a summary of the experience accumulated in the test of blood and fire during the revolutionary war years. This team came all the way from Jinggangshan, and they were not only practitioners and participants in Mao Zedong's military thought, but also parties who constantly enriched and developed the connotation of red culture in practice. Since the 80s of the last century, the tide of reform and opening up has spread violently, and many people in the XPCC have also encountered all kinds of confusion and confusion. However, they quickly got out of the confusion and hesitation, and regained their confidence and confidence under the call of "not forgetting the original intention and remembering the mission". A few years ago, some problems arose in Xinjiang, the root cause of which was the relaxation of the party's leadership, and the rapid development of the violent and terrorist forces of "Xinjiang independence" has brought great trouble to the people's livelihood and economic development. It was discovered that all the terrorist activities had avoided the Corps. There is no soil for them within the Corps, and there is no room for them to live, let alone give them the opportunity to become traitors. Because in this magical zone of "the integration of teachers and cities", the power of faith has never weakened.
Second, adhere to the collective economy and pursue common prosperity. The XPCC's culture is extracted from the practice of teamwork and collective cooperation. Without collective economy and teamwork, there would be nothing in the Corps. They did not copy the so-called contract responsibility system for joint production in the mainland, nor did they split and sell collective assets, and insisted on genuine socialist collectivism to the end. In large-scale farm production, the rapid realization of mechanization, automation, and intelligence, the research and development of new technologies, and the cultivation of new industries are simply not something that a small workshop or small business owner can do. Practice has proved that they have avoided the dead-end of the excessive capitalist private economy in the southeastern coastal areas, and have embarked on a broad road with socialist characteristics, and have achieved great success.
Third, dedication is still worth advocating, and profit-driven is not a panacea. In the years when Western culture was introduced on a large scale, the traditional virtues of the Chinese, such as serving the public in the world, putting others before themselves, and taking righteousness for profit, have been eroded. Money worship and extreme individualism are rampant, influencing generations of young people. However, in the Corps, the spirit of selfless dedication of the workers of the regiment can be felt everywhere and at all times. Generations have passed, and they have "dedicated their youth to their lives, and their children and grandchildren with their lives." Selfless dedication is the background color of the spirit of the Corps, others regard dedication as the spiritual realm of hard pursuit, and the Corps people turn selfless dedication into cultural genes and become daily life. The border guards, border patrols, and ice-fighters here, as well as the spirit of poplar and veterans here, all shine with the ideological light of communism.
Fourth, the XPCC is the highland of advanced culture, which has led and warmed up generations of XPCC members. There is cultural infiltration here, and there is also policy guidance. As mentioned above, everything that the China Folk Literature and Art Association and the XPCC Federation of Literary and Art Circles and the People's Association of the XPCC have done in the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps is the result of a two-way journey and mutual fulfillment with the history and culture of the XPCC. The XPCC culture is inclusive, inclusive, and respectful of characteristics. Everyone from all over the country is the bearer and inheritor of a local culture. The Henan opera brought by the Henan people here, the perennial performance of the Henan opera troupe is quite popular. There are singing and dancing performances of various ethnic minorities, and ethnic integration is first of all culturally isomorphic. The "Miscellaneous Drama" was also created here, and stage plays were performed in various local dialects, which became a highlight of the XPCC. The paper-cutting art here has gradually formed the characteristics of the Corps, and has become the "Bingtuan School" of China's excellent folk paper-cutting art, which is refreshing. In the mainland, the cultural team went to work in the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, and was moved and infected by the culture of the Corps, and was inspired by the spirit, which is unexpected and reasonable, and it is worth thinking about.
In short, the red gene has been passed down from generation to generation, and the XPCC culture is very leading. Under the guidance of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, the XPCC is becoming a hot spot for young generations across the country. It is becoming a trend to go to the Xinjiang XPCC and Xinjiang localities to seek employment and start a business. There are hundreds or thousands of students applying for a position, and it is no longer unique to the mainland and the southeast coastal areas. With the central government's various one-to-one counterpart support, policy support, financial support, talent support, and technical support for Xinjiang, the XPCC is entering a new era.
(The author is a senior researcher at Kunlun Ce Research Institute; Source: Kunlun Ce Network [Original] Revised Draft, Author's Authorized First Release)