When the title was awarded in 1955, 802 major generals were born. Among these major generals, do you know who is the youngest? He is Wu Zhong. In 1955, Wu Zhong was only 34 years old when he was awarded the rank of major general, the youngest founding major general of the republic (there was another major general who was only 32 years old when he was awarded major general, but this person later left for various reasons to join Turkey, so the youngest major general should be Wu Zhong), and today we will tell the story of the youngest founding major general Wu Zhong.
In 1921, Wu Zhong was born in Cangxi County, Sichuan Province. At that time, the crisis of the Chinese nation was unprecedentedly serious, the Western powers divided their spheres of influence in China one after another, and the Japanese aggressors were even more eager to look at the tiger and coveted China's northeast for a long time. Wu Zhong established the great ideal of striving for national independence from an early age, and in the process of his growth, he gradually grew into a young man who aspired to serve the country and the people.
After the defeat of the Great Revolution, in order to preserve the seeds of the revolution, our Party successively launched the Nanchang Uprising and the Autumn Harvest Uprising, but both ended in failure. At this time, the chairman believed that the revolution should be far away from the cities, and he led a unit to climb Jinggangshan and opened up the first rural revolutionary base area, the Jinggangshan Revolutionary Base Area.
Our Party also established a revolutionary base area in the Sichuan region, and in 1933, at the age of 12, Wu Zhong joined the Red Army, and two years later he joined our Party. During the Fifth Anti-"Encirclement and Suppression" War, because Wang Ming, Bogu, and others made the mistake of "leaning left," our party's army suffered heavy losses and was forced to carry out a strategic shift, starting the 25,000-mile Long March, and Wu Zhong also participated in the Long March and successfully won the victory of the Long March.
On July 7, 1937, the Japanese army created the "July 7 Incident" that shocked China and foreign countries, the national crisis was unprecedentedly serious, and the all-out War of Resistance officially broke out. The Kuomintang army led by Chiang Kai-shek opened up a frontal battlefield and engaged in four large-scale battles with the Japanese invaders, all of which ended in failure, but it greatly dealt a blow to the arrogance of the Japanese invaders and crushed Japan's attempt to destroy China for three months. At this time, our party's army focused on opening up battlefields behind enemy lines and established many anti-Japanese base areas, and Wu Zhong also followed the team stationed in the jiluyu anti-Japanese base area, sneaking up on the Japanese army through guerrilla warfare and burning the explosives depot of the Japanese army, thus laying the foundation for the final victory of the War of Resistance Against Japan.
When the War of Liberation broke out, Wu Zhong participated in the Battle of Huaihai, eliminated the effective forces of the Kuomintang army, and made outstanding contributions to the liberation of the people in the Yangtze River area. In order to peacefully liberate China, our Party held peace talks with the Kuomintang, and li Zongren on the Kuomintang side hoped to rule by crossing the river, so the Battle of Crossing the River broke out.
On April 23, 1949, Wu Zhong and his large troops planted the party flag on the Kuomintang's Nanjing Presidential Palace, overthrowing the Nanjing Nationalist Government (established in 1927), which had ruled China for 22 years. After the founding of New China, in order to commend individuals who had made outstanding contributions in the war, our party decided to implement a military rank system and awarded the rank of Major General Wu Zhong, who was only 34 years old, and Wu Zhong became the youngest founding major general.
When New China was first founded, the remnants of Chiang Kai-shek's troops were still entrenched in the southwest region of our country to commit crimes, and Wu Zhong led his troops to suppress bandits in his hometown of Sichuan, and he successfully completed his task and maintained social order in Sichuan. In the 1970s, after the reunification of Vietnam, it began to regard our country as the biggest threat to its own periphery, and with the support of the United States, Vietnam often harassed China's southwest frontier region, seriously threatening our sovereignty.
In 1979, the self-defense counterattack against Vietnam officially broke out, the 58-year-old Wu Zhong was then the deputy commander of the Guangzhou Military Region, he commanded the 40th Army and other units to launch a tenacious confrontation with the Vietnamese Army, and finally connected six cities in Vietnam, which greatly dealt a blow to the arrogance of the Vietnamese army and safeguarded the sovereignty and territorial integrity of our country.
However, after returning to China on the battlefield, Wu Zhong continued to be censored, and for eight years, until 1987, the review of Wu Zhong was ended, and it was determined that he did not participate in the "Gang of Four" and returned Wu Zhong's innocence. It was also in this year that Wu Zhong retired.
After retirement, Wu Zhong instinctively enjoyed the joy of heaven, but unfortunately, in 1990, he was suddenly in a car accident during a meeting in a car, and died at the age of 69 due to ineffective rescue.
Resources:
"Wu Zhong You zhong" - the legend of Wu Zhong, the youngest general in the history of our army, Yang Fei