On November 15, 1931, the 20th year of the Republic of China (1931), "Introduction to the South Manchurian Railway", one of the "Corner Series on the Northeast Issue" launched by the Japan Research Agency, was published in Shanghai, and the editor was Chen Bingong. Whether this pamphlet priced a corner of the ocean at that time is impossible to verify, but two points are certain, first, this kind of book introducing the South Manchuria Railway is rare at the time; second, the editor is not an idle person, in the Shanghai cultural circle, Chen Bingong is definitely a big name.
First, let's look at this "Introduction to the South Manchurian Railway", which consists of six parts, the main items are: Section 1 Introduction, Section 2 Laying and Transferring of the South Manchuria Railway, Section 3 The Mantetsu Society and the South Manchuria Railway Network, Section 4 The Undertakings Operated by the Manchurian Railway Society, Section 5 The Persecution of Our Country by the South Manchuria Railway, and Section 6 China Should Immediately Reclaim the South Manchuria Railway.
In the preface to the first section, Chen Bingong said:
"Since the Washington Conference, Japan's aggression against our country has been increasingly concentrated in our three northeastern provinces, and the most powerful instrument of its aggression against us is the South Manchuria Railway. The South Manchuria Railway, which preceded the Korean Railway, was the "wedge of Japan" that Japan invaded the Asian continent with all its strength, and was the basis for Japan's development to the mainland politically and economically. Yoshiichi Tanaka has a point. "I have the right to this major traffic artery, and I can unceremoniously invade Manchuria and implement the plan of the meiji Emperor to destroy Manchuria in the third phase." We can imagine the persecution of our country. In recent years, in order to break the difficult and dangerous future, the authorities in northeast China have worked very hard to plan and build the railway network system in the northeast, but those who have worked hard are worried about the dangers of the people of Zhengyi. The Japanese warlords and politicians sang aloud their absurd fallacies, saying that our country violated the treaty, wanted to kill Mantetsu coldly, and endangered its rights and interests in northeast China. The so-called Japanese Foreign Comrades Association. The All-Manchu Japanese Autonomous Alliance, the All-Manchu Local Committee, even more agitated for dangerous remarks, sensationalized the news of the other countrymen, saying that Mantetsu had entered a period of suffering, and advocated breaking the dangerous situation of Mantetsu by decisive means in order to safeguard its legitimate rights and interests. He also sent Kimura as the representative of the railway negotiations to actively negotiate the national highway; on the other hand, he increased the Korean garrison and increased the northeast garrison of our country, and actively made military preparations. The Wanbaoshan case, the Hanren Qiuhua case, and the so-called Lieutenant Nakamura incident occurred one after another under the planned instigation of the situation in the northeast. It is becoming more and more sinister, and the conspiracy ambitions of the Japanese are revealed. On September 18 of this year, under the pretext of our plot to bomb the South Manchuria Railway, launch a violent campaign and wage war without declaring it, in three days, our two provinces of Liaoji and Kyrgyzstan have fallen into its hands, and Tanaka's words that "I have the power to take this major traffic artery and can unceremoniously invade Manchuria and Mongolia" have now been fully realized. Now the Japanese army is entrenched in our territory. Still not retreating, full of the call for independence, singing into the clouds, the white mountains are miserable, the black water is singing, the northeast is tu, and there are many difficulties. After this trauma, when the Chinese people can more truly understand the military value other than the economic value of the so-called "Japanese wedge", the South Manchuria Railway will not be recovered for a day, and our country will not be able to sleep for a day. No more enlightenment, long night, it will not be revived. ”
On the title page of "Introduction to the South Manchuria Railway", it is printed: I would like to mourn the compatriots who were killed in the northeast under the ravages of the tyranny. After reading this text and reading the preface of the book, the reader will think that the editor must be a historian who understands railways, or at least a patriotic person with integrity. Read the following patiently, and the answer will naturally emerge slowly.
Chen Bingong, formerly known as Lesusu, Changwei, Songxuan, a native of Wu County, Jiangsu Province, was born in 1897, and his origins have always been a mystery, only to hear that he lost his father at an early age, and his mother had worked as a maid next to Luo Jialing, the wife of the rich Jewish merchant Hatong. Strictly speaking, Chen Bingong is a person with no academic qualifications, let alone universities and middle schools, and he is afraid that he will not even be able to get a primary school diploma, let alone say anything about foreign gilding. But his luck was quite good, in the early years in Shanghai, because of his mother's relationship, Chen Bingong took a teacher errand at the Cangsheng School in Hartung Garden, although the salary was not high, but he got acquainted with many former Qing dynasty elders and old-school literati who came to the school to teach or compile books, such as Zhang Taiyan, Hu Xiaoshi, Shen Zengzhi, Wang Guowei, Luo Zhenyu, and so on. Chen Bingong of the Near water tower began to dabble in the essence of traditional Chinese studies such as the subset of jingshi, especially liked various versions of the inscriptions, and practiced a beautiful Hand of Han Wei seal calligraphy, which became an important capital for him to mix in the rivers and lakes and make friends with celebrities in the future. Later, in Beijing, Chen Bingong successively became acquainted with Chen Yuan (Yuan'an), Mr. Zhang Boling and other famous artists.
It was 1926, "Three. After the massacre, Duan Qirui, the ruler of the Beiyang government, ordered the arrest of Li Shizeng, Li Dazhao, Yi Peiji, Xu Qian, and Gu Mengyu. At that time, the Beijing Daily also disclosed a so-called second-batch wanted list, counting as many as 43 people. In the list of 48 people, including the first batch of 5 people, Zhou Shuren (Lu Xun) and Zhou Zuoren ranked 21st and 22nd, and Chen Bingong ranked 31st, when his position was "former provost of civilian middle school, former general administrator of Tianjin Nankai School, and now general administrator of Sino-Russian University." The list of 48 people also includes Zhu Jiahua, Jiang Menglin, Xu Shoutang, Chen Yuan, Ma Xulun, Sun Fuyuan, Ding Weifen, etc., and these well-known professors, presidents, and politicians are on the "black list" together.
Since he had become a wanted criminal of the Beiyang government, the north could not be mixed, and Chen Bingong had to return to his old dock, Shanghai. Through Huang Yanpei's powerful introduction, he took the relationship of Wang Yunwu, the owner of the Commercial Press, and Chen Bingong's clever mouth and good handwriting actually won the appreciation of the boss, and Wang Yunwu also promised to buy his manuscript at a high price.
Chen Bingong's "writing" career began, and unlike other writers, he hardly wrote, but hired a group of "royal" gunmen to ghostwrite for him. Since then, articles and works signed "Chen Bingong" have sprung up from this "book-saving workshop".
Chen Bingong's books include: The Secret History of the Yuan Dynasty, The History of Imperialist Aggression against China, The Theory of the Current Situation of Japan, The Theory of Chinese Literature, The Puppet State of Manchuria, The History of Chinese Books, The Economic Organization and Industrial Policy of Soviet Russia, The Prediction of the Japanese-Soviet War, Chinese Characters and Calligraphy, Selected Papers of Chen Bingong, and textbooks Chinese the New Era.
Most of the "gunners" raised by Chen Bingong are skilled in chinese, English, and Japanese, such as Hu Shanyuan, a graduate of Zhijiang University, who has a high level of English, and works such as "General History of Japan" and "On Education" are translated or written by Hu.
Chen Bingong is good at running rivers and lakes, and in addition to "writing", he likes to make friends with people of various backgrounds. In 1928, he met with Eiichi Iwai (1899–?) of the Japanese Consulate General in Shanghai. A native of Aichi Prefecture, Japan, he graduated from the Business Department of the East Asian Tongwen Academy in 1921, and immediately joined the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and in 1937 he was appointed deputy consul of the Consulate General of Japan in Shanghai, and the head of the Special Investigation Class (the famous secret service "Iwai Mansion") of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He became an important member of the "Iwai Mansion" (a secret service of the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs).
In 1930, "New Era" magazine founded the monthly magazine "Japanese Studies", as the editor-in-chief, Chen Bin was busy and happy, while asking Cai Yuanpei, Ma Xiangbo, Hu Shi and other well-known figures to write titles and inscriptions, while opening up a "Japan Studies Talk" in each issue, published a series of articles on Japanese politics and economics, including many prefaces and articles signed "Chen Bingong", such as "Japanese Studies", "The Nature of Japanese Civilization", "The Spirit of Jujitsu in Japanese Nationality", "The World Nations Pay Attention to the Atrocities of the Japanese". "Japan's sudden occupation of Shenyang", "Violent Japanese Crimes in My Northeast Discussion Series", "May 3rd You Will Never Forget", "The So-called Nakamura Incident", etc.
Although "Japanese Studies" published only a few issues and ceased publication by the end of 1931, its 50,000 copies of each issue, coupled with the articles it published, either to exaggerate Japan or to sprinkle the blood of japanese scolds, it still attracted the attention of readers from all walks of life. Although the journal was short-lived, the editor-in-chief Chen Bingong had another top hat of "expert on Japanese issues" on his head.
In 1930, during the editing of the Journal of Japanese Studies, Chen Bingong went to the northeast and did a three-month field expedition, leaving his footprints in all important places in the northeast, even Manchuria on the Sino-Soviet border. The book "Introduction to the South Manchuria Railway" should be one of the results of Chen Bingong's visit to the northeast.
After the "1.28" Songhu War of Resistance, Shi Liangcai, a newspaper celebrity, reorganized the "Declaration" team, and it was Huang Yanpei who introduced to Boss Shi the "talented man" who did not look amazing and spoke a slow Suzhou official dialect, and Chen Bingong was hired as the chief writer of the "Declaration." Soon after the "chief writer," Chen Bingong published three essays on the front page of the "Declaration" -- "Suppression of Bandits and Bandits," which pointed directly at Chiang Kai-shek's policy of "suppressing the Communists, demanding that the authorities reform politics, practice democracy, stabilize the people's livelihood, and jointly resist Japan at a time when the country is in trouble.
Chen Bingong's "three theories" were like three bombshells, alarming the rulers and infuriating the chairman of the committee. As a result, the "Declaration" was suspended, and Chen Bingong was forced to resign. Chen Bingong, whose fame was originally limited to the cultural circles in Shanghai, became famous all over the country in order to anger the Supreme Leader, and laurels such as "Red Chief Writer" and "Anti-Chiang Kai-shek Fighter" flocked to him. In this highest-ranking pen and ink lawsuit that sensationalized the national press, boss Shi Liangcai and others either swallowed their anger or fled into the wilderness, and only Chen Bingong, a fat man with a bald head and fine eyes, became the winner.
After the fall of Shanghai in December 1937, the "Declaration" was discontinued. When the Pacific War broke out in December 1941, the Japanese Army closed the Declaration Hall and allowed it to resume publication a week later. On November 15, 1942, the Japanese Navy took over the Declaration. On December 6, 1942, a high-class open-top carriage stopped in front of the "Declaration" museum at No. 309 Hankou Road in the Shanghai Public Concession, and from the carriage came a bald fat man with a vivid spirit and five short statures, who was the new president Chen Bingong. At this time, Chen Bingong, who lived in a luxurious apartment on Myer Xi'ai Road in the French Concession and spent 500,000 Japanese military tickets per month, had completely degenerated into a cultural traitor who recognized thieves as fathers and was incorruptible and shameful. Under his auspices, the "Declaration" was overnight reduced to a tool of public opinion for the Japanese puppet regime, advocating a "great East Asian holy war" and plastering the aggressors with articles, many of which came from Chen Bingong's "hand."
On August 11, 1945, the "Declaration" published an article entitled "Return from Nanjing", signed "Chen Bingong", and on the same day, he disappeared from Shanghai.
In July 1946, newspapers in Chongqing and Shanghai published the news that "the Central Propaganda Department sent a letter requesting the arrest of Chen Bingong, a cultural traitor," and in November, the prosecutor of the Shanghai High Court indicted Chen Bingong for the crime of adultery.
At this time, Chen Binggong had already turned into a wisp of green smoke, and no one knew where he had drifted. President Chen, who used to call the wind and rain on the beach, seemed to have really evaporated from the human world. Many people think that Chen Bingong died a long time ago, and reference books such as the Dictionary of Figures of the Republic of China record that his year of death is 1945.
According to Chen Binggong's traitor friend and well-known newspaperman Jin Xiongbai in his later years, after the victory of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, Chen Bingong gained cover as a Catholic, first hiding in the interior, and then waiting for the opportunity to flee to Hong Kong. After arriving in Hong Kong in 1950, he changed his name to John Chen, ran a Christian publication, and later colluded with the Japanese to resell strategic materials. In 1967, Chen Binggong left Hong Kong for Japan to continue his life of cheating, drinking, and drinking. In his later years, Chen Bingong was terminally ill, like a lost dog, waddling around the streets of Japan like a zombie, lingering. Chen Bingong, who believes in the "invincible road of heaven and earth", has been mentally confused and the limit has come.
At 5:05 p.m. on August 30, 1970, Chen Bingong, a former famous cultural traitor in Shanghai Beach, died of illness at the health hospital in Suikaido City, Ibaraki Prefecture, Japan, at the age of 73.
Chen Bingong's life can be described as funny and absurd, he came from a humble origin, his appearance is not proud, with an iron mouth, a good hand, a big man, weaving connections. He was right and left, sometimes good to people, sometimes dancing with wolves. He eats everything in black and white, sometimes as a man, sometimes as a ghost.
Some people say that Chen Bingong is like an actor, and he performs a farce that makes people laugh. Some people also say that Chen Bingong was a mixed literati who "did not learn and had skills", and he compiled a series of "masterpieces" by "gunmen" who crossed the line, of course, including the "Introduction to the South Manchurian Railway" mentioned in this article.
Chen Bingong edited "Manchukuo Puppet State"
Illustration of the Puppet Kingdom of Manchuria