Cai Bo
On September 18, 1991, in Beijing, Cai Bo, a famous steel expert in modern China, left us forever.
At the farewell ceremony of Comrade Cai Bo's body, Zhou Chuandian, a famous steel expert in China, wrote in his dedication:
"Dedicated to the leader and founder of modern blast furnace technology in New China."
In a word, it summarizes Cai Bo's position in the steel industry, and for this evaluation, Comrade Cai Bo is well-deserved.
For Cai Bo, a famous steel expert, if he is not engaged in the steel industry, he may be unfamiliar.
As China's first generation of metallurgical experts, when New China was just established and waiting to be revitalized, Cai Bo contributed a very important force to the start-up of the national economy.
Cai Bo, born on May 25, 1924, in Changsha, Hunan Province, mentions Cai Bo's family lineage, which can be said to be quite promising.
Cai Bo's father, Cai Hesen, was one of the founders of the Communist Party of China, and when he was studying in Changsha, Cai Hesen, along with Mao Zedong and Xiao Zisheng, and called himself the "Three Friends of The Xiangjiang River", was recognized as a theoretician by our party. His mother, on the other hand, was Xiang Jingyu, the only female founder of the Chinese Communist Party and a prominent leader of the labor movement.
Cai he and Sen and Xiang Jianyu were arguably the most important founders and leaders of the early Chinese Communist Party, known at the time as the "Xiang Cai Alliance."
Cai Bo's aunt, Cai Chang, was one of the thirty female Red Army soldiers who completed the Long March, and after the founding of the People's Republic of China, she served as vice chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress and chairman of the All-China Women's Federation, and her uncle Li Fuchun was a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CENTRAL Committee and vice premier of the State Council.
It can be said that Cai Bo's family is a rare revolutionary home in China's modern history, and all of them are talents.
Statues of Cai Bo's grandmother, parents, aunts, and uncles
Cai Bo's parents were the first batch of young people in China to go to France to study and study, and under the leadership of Cai Bo's grandmother Ge Jianhao, the family crossed the ocean to France.
Originally, their purpose was to find the revolutionary fire to save China in France, but in the beautiful and romantic France, Cai Hesen and Xiang Jianyu sparked love between the young man and woman and married themselves.
In November 1921, after returning from work-study in France, Cai Hesen successively served as a member of the Standing Committee of the Politburo of the Central Committee and secretary of the Cpc Liangguang Provincial Committee. Since the "Second National Congress" of the CPC, Cai Hesen has long served as the leader of the CPC Central Committee and local party organizations, presided over the formulation of many lines, principles and policies of the CPC, and is one of the main leaders of the party.
Later, when attending an important meeting of seafarers in Hong Kong, Cai he and Sen were unfortunately arrested due to traitors, and were nailed to the wall by the enemy with large iron nails, and died tragically at the age of 36.
Xiang Jianyu, who returned to China with Cai and Sen, served as a member of the CPC Central Committee Executive Committee and a member of the Central Bureau, and at the same time served as the first director of the Women's Department of the CPC Central Committee.
When Cai Bo was born, the Chinese Communist Party was still in its infancy, and Cai Hesen and Xiang Jingyu were both professional revolutionaries, and they had already promised to be revolutionaries, and the family naturally could not take care of it. Therefore, less than 1 month after Cai Bo was born, his parents handed Over Cai Bo to his great aunt Cai Qingxi to raise, and then threw himself into revolutionary work.
It can be said that since his birth, Cai Bo has basically not lived with his parents, and in the process of his growth, there is no shadow of his parents.
Cai Bo's childhood was spent in his hometown in Hunan, where his grandmother Ge Jianhao took Cai Bo and Li Te te (Cai Chang's daughter) to form a family with his great aunt Cai Qingxi and his eldest cousin Liu Qianang.
At that time, the top pillar of the family was his grandmother Ge Jianhao, ge Jianhao, as a modern odd woman, followed his children and went to France at the age of 50 to work and study, setting a record at that time. With her pioneering revolutionary spirit, she influenced every child of her own.
Under the influence of his grandmother, Cai Bo had already established an extremely firm revolutionary belief at a very young age.
In early March 1927, Xiang Jingyu, who had just returned to Guangzhou from the Soviet Union, prepared to go to Wuhan to attend the Fifth National Congress of the Communist Party of China.
Cai Bo's parents, Cai Hesen and Xiang Jingyu
Before going north, Xiang Jingyu first came to Changsha by boat, and she planned to visit Ge Jianhao and her two children.
As a mother, Xiang Jingyu did not give much companionship to her own children, and since the birth of the child, Xiang Jingyu has hardly seen the child.
But in addition to her status as a revolutionary, Xiang Jianyu is also a woman after all, and the motherhood in her heart is always spurring her conscience, making her feel a lot of guilt for her children.
When she returned to her hometown in Hunan and saw one of her children, she shed tears from The Police, and she hugged Cai Bo and Cai Ni for a long time, unwilling to let go.
Looking at his growing children, Xiang Jianyu felt that he had missed too many precious things. At some point, she even wanted to spend time with her children in her hometown forever. But such thoughts did not linger in her mind for long before they dissipated, when the Revolution was at its climax, and there was so much work waiting for her that she could not stay too long.
In this way, three days later, Xiang Jianyu once again embarked on the journey.
In Cai Bo's memory, there is still a faint memory of the last time he saw his mother when he was 3 years old. At that time, Cai Bo only remembered looking at his mother's back and crying, but there was no concept of life and death. Looking at the back of his mother's fading away, in Cai Bo's small soul, it was all the expectation of seeing his mother for the next time.
But this time, Cai Bo's wish was not realized, and in March 1928, because of the traitor's betrayal, Xiang Yu was unfortunately arrested, and on May 1, he bravely became righteous, only 33 years old, at this time, less than a year after Cai Bo met his mother.
Cai Bo never knew the news of his parents' death, and his family did not tell him the news, and in the ten years after Xiang Yu's sacrifice, Cai Bo had been living in Xiangxiang County with his grandmother and aunt.
In 1938, Zhou Enlai, who was in Changsha at the time, in order to protect the descendants of the martyrs, specially instructed Li Kenong to send someone to pick up Cai Bo from Xiangxiang County Middle School.
On November 4, 14-year-old Cai Bo was picked up at the Eighth Route Army's transit station in Xiangxiang and then traveled to Chongqing, where Cai Bo got his mother and father sacrificed from Zhou Enlai and Deng Yingchao.
After Cai Bo heard it, he didn't have much sadness, just clenched his fists tightly. For this teenage child, at this time he cannot fully appreciate the sadness of the death of his parents.
Subsequently, Cai Bo was sent to the Soviet Union by the Chinese Communist Party. Since then, Cai Bo has begun a 10-year foreign life.
The person in charge of delivering Cai Bo at the time was Mao Zedong's brother Mao Zemin, at a nursing home in the town of Kuchenno in Moscow. Mao Zemin met Cai Chang, who was recuperating here.
Seeing Cai Chang, Mao Zemin said in a loud voice: "Sister Cai, come and see who I brought to you!" ”
At this time, Cai Chang came over and noticed Cai Bo standing nearby.
But Cai Chang did not recognize this as her nephew for a while, and after watching it for a while, she suddenly shouted excitedly: "Bobo, is it you?!" ”
Immediately Cai Chang took Cai Bo tightly into his arms and kissed his cheeks, and both aunts and nephews shed tears.
Cai Bo's aunt, the famous leader of the labor movement, Cai Chang
Cai Chang then personally sent Cai Bo to the Second International Children's Hospital in Moninno Town, where the children of Chinese Communists were mainly present.
In addition to Cai Bo, there are also luo yinong's son Luo Beibei, Mao Zedong's eldest son and second son Mao Anying and Mao Anqing, Liu Shaoqi's eldest son and eldest daughter Liu Yunbin and Liu Aiqin, and Zhu De's daughter Zhu Min.
The children who were sent to the International Children's Hospital of the USSR basically had the same life trajectory, separated from their parents for a long time in China, and then came to the Soviet Union in a foreign country, then to the children's home, and finally to the university.
The same is true of Cai Bo.
But unlike other children, at this time, Cai Bo's age is relatively old, more sensible, more mature, and very caring for the people around him.
Therefore, Cai Bo has a good popularity and high prestige among his classmates, and he has also become the chairman of the Chinese Children's Committee after Mao Anying and the initiator of the Chinese Alumni Association for Students Studying in the Soviet Union.
During his time in the Soviet Union, Cai Bo and Mao Anying studied for many years. Later, Mao Anying transferred to the Engels Military Academy of the Soviet Union, and after graduation, he participated in World War II, and after the war, he entered the Moscow Oriental Academy.
In 1943, Cai Bo graduated from a soviet ten-year school and began to face the choice of university entrance examination.
After some consideration, among the many colleges, Cai Bo chose the ironmaking major of the Metallurgical Department of the Moscow Iron and Steel Institute.
At that time, Cai Bo was very concerned about the situation at home, and he knew that the war would end sooner or later, and the Chinese Communist Party's troops would surely win the final victory. And with that, the country's economic development and national defense construction, which requires the support of the steel industry, so you must learn this profession well and help the construction of the motherland in the future.
After entering the Iron and Steel Institute, Cai Bo devoted himself to his studies, learning related professional knowledge every day, and among all the students, Cai Bo's results were the best, and he won the Stalin Scholarship.
After the end of World War II, many students in the Children's College, such as Liu Yunbin, Zhao Shige, Zhang Zhiming, Shen Linru, etc., all chose the Iron and Steel Institute under the influence of Cai Bo.
Because Cai Bo's achievements in the Soviet Union were very good, if he chose to stay in the Soviet Union, he could have a good treatment and development. But at this time, although Cai Bo was in the Soviet Union, his heart had already flown back to the motherland.
At the end of 1945, after returning from the Soviet-German battlefield, Mao Anying came to the student dormitory of the Iron and Steel Institute, and he gleefully told Cai Bo the good news that he was about to return to China secretly.
Cai Bo was very excited after knowing this, and at this time he was eager to return to the motherland with Mao Anying, which was his wish for many years, but due to some reasons, he could only continue to stay in the Soviet Union.
However, Cai Bo still wrote a letter to Mao Zedong on his studies in the Soviet Union and his future situation, expressing his desire to return to the motherland as soon as possible.
To the police
After Mao Anying returned to northern Shaanxi, he handed the joint letter to his father. Chairman Mao was very pleased to read the letter and wrote a reply on January 8, 1946. The full text is as follows:
Cai Bo, Zhang Zhiming, Liu Yongbin, Huang Ping, Zhao Xiaoyan, young comrades:
Yongfu (Mao Anying) returned and was very happy to receive your letter. As you have said in your letter, New China needs many scholars and technicians, and it is very appropriate for you to work in this regard.
Here, I can only write a few words to you, in short, I hope that you will grow day by day, be strong, happy, and progressive, and hope that you will unite all the Chinese young friends who remain in the Soviet Union, and everyone will study hard and return to China to serve in the future.
Hold your hands tightly!
After seeing Mao Zedong's reply, Cai Bo and other young people were extremely excited, and the leader's affirmation was not only a great encouragement for them, but also pointed out the direction of the future, which was very important for these young people.
Since then, with the all-out war of the War of Liberation, the Liberated Areas under the leadership of the Communist Party have gradually expanded their political ties with various international circles. During these years, Cai Bo's aunt Cai Chang was entrusted by the party three times to lead a women's delegation to participate in major activities of the International Women's Federation.
Almost every time Cai Chang visits, he has to go back and forth through Moscow. Cai Chang was very concerned about these young people in foreign countries, and every time he would meet with Cai Bo and other Chinese students, and brief them on the situation of domestic struggle and the plans of the Chinese Communist Party.
Listening to the excellent situation of the revolutionary war in the motherland and the burning of an invisible fire in Cai Bo's heart, he and his classmates invariably developed an unprecedented enthusiasm for understanding and learning about the revolutionary struggle at home.
Cai Bo and the older Chinese students began to study more frantically, while always paying attention to the domestic situation and preparing to return to the motherland at any time.
In June 1948, Cai Bo graduated with honors from the Moscow Iron and Steel Institute with a degree as a metallurgical engineer in ironmaking.
At this time, Cai Bo hated not being able to fly back to the motherland immediately and participate in the construction of the motherland, but because the country was in the decisive period of the liberation war at this time, Cai Bo temporarily lost contact with the party and could only stay in Moscow and wait for the call to return to China.
In August 1949, Liu Shaoqi visited the Soviet Union and took the time to have a long talk with Cai Bo.
As soon as Cai Bo saw Liu Shaoqi, he raised two very profound questions: First, why did the Chinese revolution win victories so quickly? One is what is the future of the development of the Communist Party of China?
After hearing these two questions raised by Cai Bo, Liu Shaoqi was very interested, and the two of you and I actually discussed together for more than an hour.
For Cai Bo, a young man, Liu Shaoqi was very appreciative, and Cai Bo repeatedly proposed that he wanted to return to the motherland, Liu Shaoqi was very understanding, so he decided to take him back to China together.
In this way, in 1949, after ten years of leaving the motherland, Cai Bo finally returned to his hometown, and when he left that year, Cai Bo was just a big child, and now he has grown into a promising young man.
Looking at the grass and trees of the motherland, Cai Bo left tears. She looked at the picture of her mother and her mother in her hand, and Cai Bo's heart was full of thoughts.
After Cai Bo returned to China, the first relative he saw was his uncle Li Fuchun.
Li Fuchun looked at Cai Bo very kindly, remembering the days when he spent time with Cai he and Sen and Xiang Jianyu in France, Li Fuchun also left tears.
At that time, Li Fuchun was in charge of economic work in the central government, especially the key projects of the Soviet Union to aid China, and Cai Bo asked his uncle to work in the Anshan Iron and Steel Factory and give play to his profession.
According to the professional expertise of the students who returned from the Soviet Union, Li Fuchun made comprehensive arrangements for them and arranged for Cai Bo to work at the Angang Iron and Steel Factory.
Cai Bo's uncle and state leader - Li Fuchun
At that time, Angang Steel was the largest steel joint venture in China, and in 1949, there were only 13 blast furnaces of more than 300 cubic meters in China, and Angang Steel had nine.
The ironworks are the core departments of Angang Steel, and Cai Bo knows that the burden on his body is not light.
Although Cai Bo is the child of a martyr and has returned from studying abroad, he, like others, has not enjoyed any privileges. He started as a professional and technical person, and then successively served as the deputy director of the Technical Department of Angang Steel, the deputy director of the production department, the deputy director of the ironworks, the director of the factory and other positions. It has made important contributions to the recovery and development of production in ironmaking plants, as well as the formation and promotion of modern blast furnace ironmaking technology of Angang Steel.
Cai Bo attaches great importance to the technological transformation and technological innovation of enterprises, and has led and organized a number of scientific research topics with advanced domestic level, which has made significant contributions to the recovery and development of Angang ironmaking production and the improvement of ironmaking technology.
The industrial base of old China was very weak, and there was no complete steel industry system, let alone the experience of operating large blast furnaces.
Nowadays, with the establishment of New China, all industrial sectors need the support of the steel industry, and in this case, the operation of large blast furnaces is a problem that must be overcome.
In order to improve the level of technical personnel, Cai Bo taught by example, and at the same time personally wrote and translated a large number of technical materials and related papers. And the relevant operation points were extracted and handed over to the Ministry of Heavy Industry at that time to print in the form of loose pages into a pamphlet, which was a textbook of practical and specific blast furnace operations with pictures and pictures, and it was also the only monograph on specific operations in China at that time.
Since coming to the ironworks, Cai Bo has been fully engaged in his work, and his good work style and habits have left a deep impression on people.
Cai Bo is sincere, never hides, treats everyone with his most authentic attitude, good is good, bad is bad, he will praise you, but also criticize you.
His criticism is highly targeted and targeted, and he never gets angry casually, but sometimes he makes mistakes because of his own problems, and when others give him opinions, he can always accept it with an open mind and never be stubborn.
Cai Bo has very strict requirements for the technicians he works with.
The only group photo of Cai Bo and his mother
In his view, technical personnel must strictly demand themselves, do every detail, and cannot have any sloppiness. Under the careful guidance of Cai Bo, Angang Steel has trained a large number of outstanding ironmaking experts for the country.
At that time, many of the academic views advocated by Cai Bo had a certain scientific foresight. In 1956, he presided over China's first blast furnace high-pressure operation test, making China the third country in the world after the Soviet Union and the United States to adopt this technology.
Cai Bo has always been meticulous about work, in his eyes, only work is the focus of his life, he never thinks about anything other than this.
Therefore, things like flattery are absolutely invisible to Cai Bo.
At that time, Angang steel was a model in the country, and there were often various inspection delegations, and even national leaders came to visit and inspect, which should have been the opportunity of the factory director, but Cai Bo never showed his face, and always let the deputy director Zhou Chuandian come forward to socialize.
After the Bandung Conference in October 1954, Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and his daughter Indira Gandhi came to visit, and the Party Central Committee attached great importance to it and specially explained that Angang Steel should be solemnly received.
However, after receiving the notice, Cai Bo still explained to deputy director Zhou Chuandian as usual: "Old Zhou, I have a meeting in the afternoon, you go and arrange the reception!" ”
Mao Zedong's letter to Cai Bo and others
In Cai Bo's eyes, no matter who came, there was no way to stop his daily work arrangement.
Another characteristic of Cai Bo is that he dares to tell the truth, others dare not say, he dares to say, others dare not mention, he dares to mention.
In the early 1950s, China's steel industry has just started, when the quality of ironmaking raw materials is generally not high, but due to political factors, in the producers, many times one-sided pursuit of high smelting strength, blast furnaces are generally sulfur, and once the blast furnace is sulfur, many times it can not be produced for several days.
At this time, Cai Bo proposed to abandon the high smelting intensity of the main ball and choose a medium smelting strength to ensure continuous production. Such a proposal was undoubtedly in line with the actual situation at the time, but due to the problems of the external environment, almost no one dared to mention it. But Cai Bo has always adhered to this view.
In the late 1950s, as Sino-Soviet relations deteriorated and the "Left" trend of thought within the CCP became more and more serious, some of the methods he promoted in the ironworks caused great controversy because of Cai Bo's Soviet background.
A year later, as the movement expanded, Cai Bo was suspended for reflection.
In May 1959, Cai Bo was transferred from Angang Steel to the Ironmaking Office of Beijing Iron and Steel Research Institute to engage in research work.
Although Cai Bo, who was transferred from the front line, is very unwilling, as long as he can continue to work and continue to contribute to the motherland, it is enough for Cai Bo.
When he was in Beijing, Cai Bo presided over several major scientific research projects, and together with his colleagues, he forgot to eat and sleep, painstakingly studied the smelting process of Baotou and Panzhihua, and improved the smelting level by a large margin.
In 1962, Cai Bo was the first to propose a blast furnace coal injection test to the Ministry of Metallurgical Industry, which was a very advanced technical idea at the time, but due to the ensuing political storm, Cai Bo was affected and could not continue. It was not until 1979 that Cai Bo led the construction of the blast furnace coal injection cold state test device, and further developed the blast furnace coal injection thick phase conveying technology and its device.
In 1982, Cai Bo, who resumed his work, systematically summarized the history of China's blast furnace strengthening technology, and based on his own personal experience, he wrote the article "Thirty Years of Ironmaking Research of the Iron and Steel Research Institute".
This article was highly praised by Marshal Nie Rongzhen.
Nie Shuai was the director of the State Science and Technology Commission at that time, and after reading Cai Bo's article, he specially wrote a letter to him and said:
"Your summary of iron-making scientific research in the past thirty years is very important, this is the first systematic summary of scientific research work in the industrial sector that I have seen, and I hope that the lead will be printed and sent to the relevant departments and central leading comrades for reference."
With his usual pragmatic spirit, Cai Bo was blunt and frank in his opinion:
"Since 1958, we have actually generally implemented a policy of miniaturization of blast furnace volume as the general premise, abandoning the coke ratio, and pursuing smelting intensity, that is, the so-called "concentrate, high wind, high temperature" policy. This policy swept the country and actually hindered the progress of large and medium-sized blast furnaces in key enterprises across the country. ”
In the text, Cai Bo said bitterly:
"Looking back at the scientific research and summarization work of this period, we cannot but point out the common disease of the times that they have infected: the profound imprint laid by the left-leaning line of economic construction."
This paper reflects Cai Bo's pragmatic character, enabling him to comprehensively observe and understand problems, which is his superiority. It is precisely because of this that in the storm of ten years, Cai Bo's situation will be very difficult.
In his later years, Cai Bo has been committed to the study of the development strategy of China's steel industry, and first put forward the construction principle of "big ship, big port and big factory", which was published in the collection of the 1991 National Ironmaking Annual Conference, which was his last paper.
In addition, in his later years, Cai Bo also conducted in-depth research on his father Cai Hesen and mother Xiang Jingyu, providing a lot of information for his hometown and relevant DEPARTMENTs for the study of the history of the CPC.
During this period, he returned to his hometown many times to participate in and guide the commemorative activities of Cai Hesen and Cai Chang.
In September 1991, Cai Bo was invited back to Twin Peaks to attend the opening ceremony of the first anniversary of the death of Comrade Cai Chang and the display of comrade Cai Chang's life deeds.
After returning to Beijing, Cai Bo died suddenly at the age of 67 due to years of overwork and sudden heart attack.
Cai Bo's life has been full of ups and downs, he has not lived with his grandmother since childhood, his parents died early, and in the war years, he spent the most precious decade of his life in a foreign country.
Cai Bo and his aunt Cai Chang were in Moscow
And this experience also made Cai Bo in that storm in the doom, in the entire steel research institute he was the first to be affected, and the last to be liberated.
The misunderstandings lasted for a decade.
But Unlike most people, Cai Bo did not give up any hope, but regarded this encounter as a lesson in party history, during which time Cai Bo carefully read the original version of The work of Marxism and Leninism, and in this way, he dispelled his inner fluctuations.
Although Cai Bo is a reticent person, there is a raging fire burning in the depths of his heart.
Looking back on Cai Bo's life, for the country and the nation, he has done everything he can do and dedicated his life. In the face of the difficulties of life, he also used his own faith, firmly walked over, he grew up in the era of war, although he did not go to the battlefield, but with his own strength, made an extremely important contribution to the steel cause of new China. It can be said that Cai Bo's name will not be inferior to his grandparents and fathers. In the history of the new China's steel industry, he has a strong and colorful stroke, and history will always remember his contribution and never fade.