Old photo of Zhou Enlai's Whampoa Military Academy
On January 20, 1924, the first national congress of the Chinese Kuomintang was held in the auditorium of the National Higher Normal School in Guangzhou, during which Sun Yat-sen decided to establish the Kuomintang Army Officer School (commonly known as the Whampoa Military Academy), appointed Chiang Kai-shek as the chairman of the Preparatory Committee, Wang Bailing, Li Jishen, Shen Yingshi, Lin Zhenxiong, Yu Feipeng, Song Rongchang, Deng Yanda, and Zhang Jiarui as members of the Preparatory Committee, and successively hired the Soviets Borodin and Galen as political advisers and military advisers. The Communist Party of China appointed Zhang Shenfu to participate in the preparatory work. On May 5, 1924, the Whampoa Military Academy was formally established, subordinate to the Kuomintang Central Executive Committee, the prime minister, the president, the party representative (equivalent to the political commissar) to form the headquarters of the school, under the political, professor, coach, management, quartermaster, military doctor and other departments and the general instructor's office, after the department settings were slightly adjusted. On May 12, Sun Yat-sen appointed the first batch of instructors, the first director of the political department was Dai Jitao, and the deputy director was Zhang Shenfu, a member of the Chinese Communist Party. The Director of the Political Department is the Chief of Staff of the Party Representative and may, in exceptional circumstances, act as a Party deputy.
Opening ceremony of the Whampoa Military Academy: Sun Yat-sen, Soong Ching-ling, Chiang Kai-shek and Liao Zhongkai
Dai Jitao was Chiang Kai-shek's classmate who stayed in Japan and was a brother who worshiped the shogun. However, less than a month after the opening of the Whampoa Military Academy, Dai Jitao did not quit because of the internal contradictions of the Kuomintang. The director of the Political Department was represented by Shao Yuanchong, then deputy director. Shao Yuanchong was an old-school literati who could not do political work at all, resulting in the political department becoming ineffective. The teachers and students of the whole school were extremely dissatisfied and strongly demanded the removal of Shao Yuanchong. Liao Zhongkai, a party representative of the Whampoa Military Academy, echoed the demands of the vast number of teachers and students, and after meeting with the principal Chiang Kai-shek and the Soviet military adviser General Garen, decided to ask the Chinese communists to recommend an appropriate person to take over as director of the political department.
Zhang Shenfu (first from left) and Zhou Enlai (second from right) and others
Zhang Shenfu strongly recommended Zhou Enlai to serve at the Whampoa Military Academy
In July 1924, the Central Committee instructed Zhou Enlai, who was working and studying in France, to return to China to carry out the united front work of the Kuomintang and the Communist Party. Zhang Shenfu was the founder of the earliest communist group of the CCP, and during his stay in France, he became acquainted with Zhou Enlai, and the two had similar interests and deep feelings, and Zhang Shenfu also introduced Zhou Enlai and Zhu De to join the party organization. Zhang Shenfu participated in the preparation of the Whampoa Military Academy as deputy director of the Political Department, and was the highest-ranking member of the Communist Party of China at the Whampoa Military Academy at that time. Liao Zhongkai and Dai Jitao repeatedly asked Zhang Shenfu to recommend outstanding students studying abroad to work at the Whampoa Military Academy. Zhang Shenfu recommended 15 Communist Party members who studied abroad, and the first person on the list was Zhou Enlai, in addition to Yun Daiying, Zhao Shiyan and others on the list.
Liao Zhongkai and his wife He Xiangning and their children Liao Chengzhi and Liao Mengxing
With the consent of Liao Zhongkai and Dai Jitao, Zhang Shenfu immediately wrote a letter inviting Zhou Enlai to work at the Whampoa Military Academy and applied to Liao Zhongkai (then minister of finance of the Guangdong revolutionary government) to settle Zhou Enlai's travel expenses back to China. In June 1924, Zhang Shenfu resigned as deputy director of the Political Department. In September 1924, at the recommendation of Zhang Shenfu and the invitation of Liao Zhongkai, Zhou En went to the Whampoa Military Academy as a political instructor to teach political economy to the first batch of students. Because Zhou Enlai's work was extremely outstanding, the situation of the work of the Political Department, which was almost empty, was greatly improved. Only two months after entering the Whampoa Military Academy, Zhou Enlai was appointed director of the Political Department, beginning a revolutionary career of special historical significance.
Build a political work system of the Whampoa Military Academy and experience extraordinary political and military leadership talents
Couplet in front of the Whampoa Military Academy
Zhou Enlai was only 26 years old when he became director of the political department of the Whampoa Military Academy, but soon showed outstanding political and military leadership skills. Drawing on the experience of the Soviet Union in creating the Red Army, he gradually established a complete set of effective political work systems, perfected political work organs, set up party representatives at all levels, taught the Three People's Principles and Marxism, opened political courses with the latest content, strong theoretical and practical nature, and carried out various forms of ideological and political education, thus opening up a new situation in the political work of the Whampoa Military Academy and even the Later National Revolutionary Army.
A rare group photo of Chiang Kai-shek and Zhou Enlai during the Whampoa Military Academy
The first is to establish and improve the organizational structure and work system of the Political Department. After Zhou Enlai took office, he fully absorbed the experience of the Soviet Union in creating the Red Army, straightened out the original leading body of the Political Department, added additional organizational structures, set up three units of "guidance", "compilation", and "secretary", and selected outstanding Communist Party members from among the graduates of the huangpu first term to serve in order to ensure the efficient and orderly operation of the work of the Political Department. It clarified the purpose of political work, stipulated the scope of power and work responsibilities of leaders at all levels, divided the work of political and ideological education in the whole school, and formulated work rules and regulations, such as the "Service Rules of the Political Department", "The Regulations of the Political Instructors of the Political Department of the University", "The Regulations on the Organization of Propaganda Teams", and "The Rules for Political Seminars". The establishment of the above-mentioned system has played a very important role in standardizing the political education work of military academies. In addition, permanent political instructors have been hired, political training courses have been established, political seminars have been organized, and the system of political work has been improved. The political work system of the Whampoa Military Academy was later comprehensively popularized in the Military Academy's Teaching Regiment, the First Army, and the National Revolutionary Army, which played an important role in improving the army's political quality and combat effectiveness and in promoting the Northern Expedition. The political work system pioneered by the Whampoa Military Academy also provided valuable experience for the independent leadership of the revolutionary armed forces by the Communist Party of China.
Young Zhou Enlai
The second is to improve and enrich the content of political teaching. The forms of political education are flexible and diverse, and the military academies have a new look. At that time, the political courses offered at that time included: the history of the Chinese Kuomintang, the Three People's Principles, the history of imperialist aggression against China, the history of modern Chinese history, the history of social evolution, the introduction to sociology, social issues, socialism, political science, economics, the history of economic thought, the comparison of constitutions of various countries, the political and economic situation of China, the world political and economic situation, and the political and economic geography. In addition to arranging for party deputies and Soviet advisers to personally give lectures to conduct political education for students, they also specially invited Xiao Chunu, Yun Daiying, Zhang Qiuren, Nie Rongzhen, Gao Yuhan, Zhou Yiqun, Han Linfu, Xu Deheng, and other well-known communist party members and revolutionaries to serve as political instructors at the military academy, and also invited Mao Zedong, Liu Shaoqi, Zhang Tailei, Su Zhaozheng, Lu Xun, and other political activists and social celebrities to give speeches at the school. Zhou Enlai often gave lectures to the students, giving reports such as "Political Work in the Army" and "Force and the People." The Political Department has set up clubs, organized officers and men to carry out political discussions and research, set up the Blood Flower Drama Society, mimeographed "Friends of Soldiers", set up posters, published political publications such as "Whampoa Daily", "Armed Forces and the People", "Imperialism", and "Overview of Revolutionary Movements in Various Countries" to propagate revolutionary ideas.
The third is to strengthen and expand the political influence of the CPC at the Whampoa Military Academy. Under the leadership of Zhou Enlai, the CCP's party organization at the Whampoa Military Academy developed rapidly. Among outstanding students, we should actively develop Communist Party members and youth league members, set up the China Young Soldiers' Federation with party members and league members as the backbone, publish and distribute the journal "Chinese Soldiers", publicize Marxism-Leninism, and unite and educate teachers and students of military academies and military personnel throughout the country. In January 1926, Xiong Xiong, a member of the Communist Party, took over as director of the Political Department, and until the 1927 "April 12" counter-revolutionary coup, the political work of the Whampoa Military Academy was directly led by the Communists.
Fourth, attention should be paid to combining political education with military education, and the military's political education work in wartime played an important role. Zhou Enlai's wartime political work with Huangpu students, officers and men achieved remarkable results, including "requiring the army to maintain strict discipline," "carrying out political propaganda to the masses," and "strengthening the people's organizational work." Zhou Enlai also gave military academy chiefs at all levels extra "small stoves" for political education, and arranged special lectures two nights a week, with the topics of the speeches drawn up by the Political Department and inviting celebrities from all walks of life to give speeches at the school. Peng Bai once talked about the Guangdong Haifeng peasant movement, Li Qiushi talked about the national youth movement, Deng Zhongxia talked about the provincial and Hong Kong general strike, He Xiangning talked about Liao Zhongkai's revolutionary strategy, Song Ziwen talked about finance, and so on. Mao Zedong and Liu Shaoqi have both given speeches here.
He was forced to leave the Whampoa Military Academy because of the jealousy of the Kuomintang rightists and Chiang Kai-shek's platoon
Zhou Enlai's outstanding contributions after he became director of the political department of the Whampoa Military Academy were highly praised by our party and the vast number of progressive teachers and students, but they also aroused the concern and envy of the right wing of the Kuomintang. Wang Boling, director of the professorial department, known as Chiang Kai-shek's "first hand," unscrupulously sent people to spy on communists and progressive students. Zhou Enlai presided over a meeting of the Huangpu Special Branch Committee of the CPC and decided that Jiang Xianyun and others would come forward to publicly expose wang Boling's sabotage of cooperation between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party, thus sweeping Wang Boling's prestige to the ground. The Whampoa Military Academy left behind the good story of Zhou Enlai interrupting Chiang Kai-shek's "first hand."
General Wang Bailing, who participated in the establishment of the Whampoa Military Academy
Chiang Kai-shek was extremely dissatisfied with the situation in which the CPC members in the Whampoa Military Academy were thriving and their influence was growing day by day, and once told Zhou En: "In order to ensure the reunification of the Whampoa Military Academy, I see only two methods, the first of which is that all the Communists in the Whampoa Military Academy will quit the Communist Party and become pure Kuomintang members; if this is not possible, the second way is for communists to withdraw from the Whampoa Military Academy and quit the Kuomintang." In March 1926, Chiang Kai-shek ordered the arrest of dozens of Communists, including Li Zhilong, acting director of the Naval Bureau, under the pretext that "zhongshan warships are going to shell the Whampoa Military Academy.", which is known as the "Zhongshan warship incident." The day after the incident, Zhou Enlai questioned Chiang Kai-shek, who was treated roughly, the guards brought by Zhou Enlai were disarmed, and Zhou Enlai was also placed under house arrest for a day. In early April 1926, Chiang Kai-shek demanded that communist elements in the army should temporarily withdraw from the army, and that the party representatives of the National Revolutionary Army should be fully Kuomintang members (without dual party membership). More than 250 CCP members whose identities had been exposed were forced to withdraw from the National Revolutionary Army and the Whampoa Military Academy, and Zhou Enlai was forced to resign as deputy party representative of the First Army and director of the political department, ending his career at the Whampoa Military Academy for about a year and a half. At this time, Chiang Kai-shek's plot to sabotage the cooperation between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party and squeeze the living space of the CCP was gradually exposed, and then launched the "April 12" counter-revolutionary coup in 1927.
Chiang Kai-shek and Soviet military adviser Garren on the way to the Northern Expedition in 1926
During Zhou Enlai's tenure as director of the political department of the Whampoa Military Academy, he maintained a good teacher-student relationship with the senior Kuomintang generals who came out of the Whampoa Military Academy. It laid a solid foundation for the establishment of ties between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression and the War of Liberation and for carrying out united front work. When Zhou Enlai left the Whampoa Military Academy, Hu Zongnan, a student of the first phase, asked several classmates to send Zhou Enlai off. Although Hu Zongnan was 3 years older than Zhou Enlai when he was a student at the Whampoa Military Academy, during his time at the school, Hu Zongnan's most respected instructor was Zhou Enlai. Hu Zongnan once said to Zhou Enlai, "You will always be my teacher"! Zhou Enlai's outstanding organizational leadership skills and personality charm left a deep impression on the teachers and students of the Whampoa Military Academy.
Zhou Enlai, General Political Commissar of the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army
The Whampoa Military Academy trained one of the earliest outstanding soldiers in China, and the generals were born from one generation to the next. Zhou Enlai served at the Whampoa Military Academy for only a little more than a year, and in such a special academy that cultivated china's high-level political and military talents, Zhou Enlai's political and military leadership ability was well trained and brought into play, which played an extremely important role in his long and arduous revolutionary career in the future.
Zhou Enlai sent a language journal to middle school students
(The above picture is from the network)