Military rank is a symbol of military honor and a kind of affirmation and commendation of the state for the meritorious servicemen; the great award of the title in 1955 is a kind of commendation of the PLA generals who have made outstanding military achievements in the process of the founding of New China.
A total of 1,048 founding generals were born, of which 798 were awarded the rank of major general, and 4 of them were controversial, namely He Jinnian at the deputy corps level, Xie Fang, Duan Suquan, and Chen Yi at the rank of quasi-corps; among them, He Jinnian and Xie Fang, as we have already said before, today we will talk about General Chen Yi in detail.
In 1952, when the army was rated, General Chen Yi, then minister of culture in the General Political Department of the People's Liberation Army, was rated as a quasi-corps. Therefore, when the title was awarded in 1955, according to the standard of "deputy and quasi-corps rank, most can be awarded to lieutenant general", General Chen Yi should be awarded the rank of lieutenant general, but only awarded the rank of major general.
Chen Yi, who joined the revolution in 1929, was a cultural man who served successively as the executive committee of the Left League, the director of the Northern Cultural General League, and the secretary of the party group during the period of the agrarian revolution, and he had been fighting with the Kuomintang for propaganda positions and fighting a battle of public opinion until 1937, when he entered the Eighth Route Army.
In the army, General Chen Yi has also been engaged in logistical and propaganda work, successively serving as chief of the civil movement section of the Taihang Guerrilla Command, director of the Propaganda Department of the Shandong Branch, director of the Propaganda Department of the General Political Department of the Northeast Democratic Coalition Army, deputy director of the Northeast Field Political Department, and political commissar of the Logistics Department of the Northeast Field Army; he has never been on the front line, so he has not made any military achievements.
Moreover, in 1933, Chen Yi was also arrested by the Kuomintang authorities; in prison, he was very strong, in the face of the Kuomintang's threats and inducements, he always gritted his teeth and did not confess anything, until 1935, he was redeemed by his father at a heavy cost; after his release from prison, he first returned to his hometown in Guizhou, and then returned to Shanghai to serve as the editor of the "Salvation Daily", until after the Xi'an Incident in 1936, he re-established contact with the party organization. That is to say, for more than three years from 1933 to 1936, Chen Yi and the party organization were in a state of disconnection.
Therefore, when the title was awarded in 1955, Chen Yi, who was then the minister of culture of the General Political Department of the People's Liberation Army, although he was a cadre at the rank of quasi-corps, because he had always been engaged in logistics and propaganda work, had no outstanding combat achievements, lacked experience in the army during the Red Army period, and had disappeared for a time; therefore, he was only awarded the rank of major general.
In 1958, the "cultural general" Chen Yi was beaten as a "rightist", expelled from the party and the military, and sent to the Qiqihar Horticultural Experimental Station as deputy station chief, after which Chen Yi successively served as deputy director of the office of the Nenjiang Agricultural Research Institute, deputy director of the Shuangcheng Tractor Station, deputy director of the Harbin Second Light Bureau, etc. During the special decade, he was detained and criticized again, and it was not until 1979, after Deng Gong's return, that he was rehabilitated, and 21 years had passed.
After that, General Chen Yi served as deputy secretary of the Shanghai Municipal PARTY Committee and director of the Propaganda Department, deputy director of the Standing Committee of the Shanghai Municipal People's Congress and director of the Financial and Economic Committee
On July 26, 2002, General Chen Yi died in Shanghai at the age of 90 due to ineffective medical treatment.
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