On April 30, 1948, Chairman Mao issued an appeal, hoping that all democratic parties and people's organizations in China would send representatives to the CPPCC session to jointly discuss the establishment of a democratic coalition government. Soon, Peiping was peacefully liberated, and the New Political Consultative Conference was prepared to be held here.
At this time, the remnants of the Kuomintang were still thieves, and Chiang Ching-kuo, who knew about this, secretly sent spies to plan for him to infiltrate Beiping and approach Premier Zhou Enlai, waiting for the opportunity to steal intelligence information.
When our Party learned of this, it decided to get rid of this agent as soon as possible in order to avoid causing losses. However, at that time, Peiping gathered important figures from many domestic groups, and if a hasty search was carried out, it was easy to cause unnecessary panic and suspicion. In the end, the experienced Comrade Li Kenong, with only three brief pieces of information, successfully identified this agent who was mixed in Peiping and tried to approach Premier Zhou Enlai.
How did Li Kenong find out the truth? Who is this agent that Chiang Ching-kuo has painstakingly installed?
In 1949, at this time, the country experienced the Liaoshen Campaign, the Pingjin Campaign and the Huaihai Campaign, the main forces of the Kuomintang reactionaries were annihilated, and the whole country was basically liberated.
Chiang Kai-shek led the remnants of the forces to retreat to the Taiwan region, forming a confrontation with the mainland. Although the Kuomintang suffered heavy losses, Chiang Kai-shek never gave up the idea of counterattacking the mainland. By accepting American aid, Chiang Kai-shek reorganized his army, implemented reforms, and waited for the opportunity to attack.
Under the influence of his father's dictatorial rule, Chiang Ching-kuo has been actively seeking a breakthrough in attacking the mainland in order to gain power and status in the Kuomintang at an early date.
To this end, Chiang Ching-kuo also flew to Chongqing to meet with Ji Yuanbo, director of the Kuomintang Bureau of Investigation, and plotted to send agents to Beiping. The CCP intelligence commissioner in the Chongqing area at the time learned of this information and quickly reported it to the CPC Central Committee.
Li Kenong, then director of the Intelligence Department of the Central Military Commission, received the information, which contained only a few words: "Chiang Ching-kuo entered Chongqing and met with Ji Yuanbo, director of the Investigation Bureau." After seeing the intelligence, Li Kenong attached great importance to it, and he instructed the intelligence officers in the Chongqing area to continue to pay attention to Ji Yuanbo's movements and immediately report the situation to the central authorities.
Considering that the Beiping region was preparing for the new CPPCC meeting, Li Kenong's many years of combat experience told him that Chiang Ching-kuo's entry into Chongqing must be related to this new CPPCC meeting.
Photo: Li Kenong
At that time, the Kuomintang's attitude toward the Chinese Communist Party was nothing more than two, one was to use violent solutions, sending people to shoot or arrest Communists or revolutionary volunteers, and the other was a roundabout route, sending agents to infiltrate the Chinese Communist Party, in an attempt to encroach on the structure of the Chinese Communist Party from within, and at the same time stealing intelligence from within for the Kuomintang to formulate countermeasures.
However, after the Kuomintang defeated And retreated from Taiwan, its strength was greatly reduced, and now that it is in the Peiping territory, they will certainly not resort to armed violence to solve the problem, and it is only possible that Chiang Ching-kuo attempted to send agents to infiltrate Beiping and sabotage the new CPPCC meeting.
Thinking of this, Li Kenong immediately ordered all units of the Intelligence Bureau to pay close attention to the flow of personnel in the Beiping area. In order not to cause panic among other patriots in the Beiping area, he privately approached Tan Zhengwen, director of the Beiping Public Security Bureau, to discuss countermeasures together.
After learning of this incident, Tan Zhengwen agreed with Li Kenong's analysis, but the two still decided to stay still first, to see what the Kuomintang director Ji Yuanbo would do, and then carry out the next countermeasures.
Photo: Tan Zhengwen
Sure enough, the second top-secret intelligence from the Chongqing area verified Li Kenong's conjecture. This information shows that shortly after Chiang Ching-kuo and Ji Yuanbo met, Ji Yuanbo secretly met with a middle-aged man with a slightly fat posture, and the two talked for nearly two hours.
After discussion between Li Kenong and Tan Zhengwen, they agreed that this mysterious man was the key figure in the Kuomintang's secret service operation. However, without a specific name and appearance, the vast sea of people, how to accurately locate this "slightly fat middle-aged man"?
At this time, chongqing intelligence officers sent a third telegram: "Zhang Lisheng entered Chongqing, the reason is unknown." After learning the contents of the telegram, Li Kenong's heart was alarmed: This Zhang Lisheng was an important confidant of Chiang Kai-shek of the Kuomintang, and he was once a classmate of Premier Zhou Enlai at the Nankai School in Tianjin. Could it be that Chiang Kai-shek wanted to spy on Premier Zhou Enlai by sending spies close to Him, and then taking the opportunity to spy on intelligence?
In the end, the two decided to investigate step by step the people of various parties who were going to attend the CPPCC meeting, and after a large number of secret searches, Li Kenong finally determined that the "slightly fat middle-aged man" mentioned in the intelligence was a businessman from Hong Kong, Zhao Binggu.
He quickly sent someone to conduct a detailed investigation of this Zhao Ice Valley. The results of the investigation show that since Zhao Binggu came to Beiping, he has been visiting the deputies who will attend the CPPCC session, such as Li Jishen, Zhang Lan, General Li Minghao, Yang Hu and his wife, Chen Mingde and his wife, and others.
After Li Kenong learned of the results of the investigation, he felt that things were getting more and more difficult. Li Jishen, Zhang Lan, and others are all important figures attending the CPPCC meeting, and if this matter is handled improperly, it is easy to affect the normal course of the CPPCC meeting.
Therefore, Li Kenong immediately reported to Ye Jianying, director of the Central Military Commission, and after careful consideration, Ye Jianying sent someone to inform Li Jishen and Zhang Lan separately, asking them to meet with Li Kenong and cooperate with the investigation.
Li Jishen, chairman of the Revolutionary Committee of the Chinese Kuomintang, actively responded to the Communist Party's call for unity against Japan as early as the War of Resistance Against Japan, openly opposed Chiang Kai-shek, and formed a deeply cooperative partnership with the Communist Party. When he learned that the CPC Central Committee had called on all democratic parties to come to Beiping and jointly convene a political consultative conference, Li Jishen was very happy in his heart, actively responded to the call, and expressed support for the PARTY Central Committee with Mao Zedong as the core.
Photo: Li Jishen
When he learned that Li Kenong was going to meet with him, Li Jishen was very surprised. When Li Kenong asked if he had intersected with Zhao Binggu a few days ago, Li Jishen was even more confused. Zhao Binggu was a friend of his own during the Kuomintang period, and he did meet him herself.
Although he didn't know why Li Kenong asked himself, just in case, he hurriedly told Li Kenong everything about his conversation with Zhao Binggu to get rid of his suspicions.
As an important leader of the China Democratic League, Zhang Lan's participation in this CPPCC meeting is also a matter of course. Li Kenong was worried that Zhao Binggu would take advantage of his friendship with Zhang Lan to spy on intelligence, and Zhang Lan also understood the importance of this matter and was very cooperative with the investigation.
After comparing the words of Li Jishen and Zhang Lan, Li Kenong learned that the reason why Zhao Binggu approached these two important CPPCC members was to win them a vote for themselves at the CPPCC meeting. Li Kenong became more and more certain that this Zhao Binggu was deliberately approaching the central high-level and would definitely plot against him.
Photo: Zhang Lan
As for why Zhao Binggu met with General Li Minghao, Li Kenong deduced that this should be related to the proximity to Premier Zhou Enlai. General Li Minghao was an old friend of Premier Zhou Enlai, and the two developed a deep revolutionary friendship during the Xibaipo period. Zhao Binggu must have wanted to use General Li Minghao's matchmaking to seize the opportunity to approach Premier Zhou Enlai.
General Li Minghao's testimony also shows that this Zhao Binggu just wants to get close to Premier Zhou. Li Kenong was very shocked, Premier Zhou Enlai's personal safety is very important, in case this Zhao Binggu caught the opportunity to approach Premier Zhou, it is very likely that there will be murder.
Now that the witnesses and testimonies were complete, Li Kenong immediately ordered the search for Zhao Binggu's residence, and sure enough, he found a document of the Kuomintang "Southeast Work Group," which once again confirmed Zhao Binggu's identity as a spy.
On September 20, 1949, Zhao Binggu and his wife were taken into custody and imprisoned. Looking at the evidence in front of him, Zhao Binggu knew that there was no longer a possibility of denial, and could only explain the whole thing.
Because of the importance of Chen Lifu and others, he was repeatedly promoted to the secret service group of the Kuomintang government in Nanjing. In order to gain the trust of the Kuomintang, he vigorously smeared the image of the Communist Party and even compiled a book called "Perspectives on the Communist Party". This move made him even more prosperous in the official arena, and on the surface he was a major general in the Kuomintang Military Commission, and secretly he was a high-ranking agent.
After the end of the War of Resistance Against Japan, in order to be able to hide from the eyes of the Communist Party, Zhao Binggu resigned from the official position of the Kuomintang and returned to Hong Kong to run a business. Chen Lifu met with him many times and told him that while doing business in Hong Kong, he could appropriately make remarks against the Kuomintang, create an image of an advanced person who actively draws closer to the Communist Party, and wait for the opportunity to infiltrate the Ccp.
In 1948, Chiang Ching-kuo flew to Chongqing On a special plane, met with Ji Yuanbo of the Kuomintang Bureau of Investigation, plotted to infiltrate Beiping, approach premier Zhou Enlai, and spy on the cppcc meeting. After consideration, the KMT finally believed that Zhao Binggu, who had been doing business in Hong Kong for five years, was the most suitable agent candidate.
Chen Lifu gave Zhao Binggu 10,000 yuan as a fund for his activities, and gave him the specific task of going to Chongqing and listening to the dispatch of Ji Yuanbo, the Kuomintang's internal affairs department.
Pictured: Chen Lifu and Chiang Ching-kuo
Subsequently, Zhao Binggu quietly flew to Chongqing to meet with Ji Yuanbo in secret. Ji Yuanbo told him that the Chinese Communist Party was preparing to organize a political consultative conference in Beiping, and that Zhao Binggu needed to disguise himself as a "progressive person opposing the Kuomintang" and go to Beiping to attend the meeting, taking the opportunity to approach Zhou Enlai and spy on secret intelligence.
When Zhao Binggu heard that he wanted to approach the central figures of the Chinese Communist Party, he repeatedly waved his hand in refusal, saying: "I have been in Hong Kong for such a long time, and I have not been to the mainland for a long time." I don't know anything about such an important figure as Zhou Enlai, so how can I get close to it? ”
Ji Yuanbo said with a mysterious face: "Don't worry about this, I have already let Zhang Lisheng come to Chongqing, he was once a classmate of Zhou Enlai, he can help you with this." ”
At this point, Zhao Binggu could only agree. In order to "make enough drama," the Kuomintang also planned a "bitter meat plan" and detained Zhao Binggu in the prison of the Sichuan Provincial Secrecy Bureau under the pretext of eliminating the identity of the traitor. They also manipulated public opinion and made extensive reports through newspapers, creating the identity of Zhao Binggu's "advanced person".
In order to add another layer of protection to himself, he also specially took his wife to Beiping, but his wife did not know the things that Zhao Binggu did behind his back, until she was arrested and imprisoned, she also naively thought that Zhao Binggu was an innocent businessman.
When visiting Li Jishen and Zhang Lan, Zhao Binggu also brought some forged letters, saying that he was planning a democratic uprising in order to cooperate with the PLA troops entering Sichuan. Seeing these letters, coupled with hearing that Zhao Binggu was also arrested and imprisoned by the Kuomintang reactionaries for "ideological progress," Li Jishen and Zhang Lan believed him even more and promised to support Zhao Binggu at the CPPCC meeting.
Zhao Binggu was promised by these two key figures, and he was very proud of himself and began to plan the action close to Premier Zhou Enlai. In order to win the trust and reuse of Premier Zhou Enlai, he set his sights on General Li Minghao, who was also in Beiping.
Photo: Li Minghao
In Zhao Binggu's view, Li Minghao and Zhou Enlai have been "old friends" for many years, and if he can help himself with a few kind words, then Premier Zhou Enlai will certainly favor himself, and his latent mission in Beiping will be easier in the future.
But what he didn't know was that the seemingly "seamless" plan had long been seen by Li Kenong and others.
In this way, Li Kenong broke through the fog with only these three brief pieces of information and successfully captured the masked agent. If it were not for the rich experience accumulated by Comrade Li Kenong in the course of the revolution over a long period of time, if it were not for the investigative ability of our party's intelligence personnel, and if it were not for the active cooperation between various departments, the Zhao Binggu case would certainly have been a "difficult bone to gnaw."
Today's happy life is inseparable from the burden of these ancestors to move forward and pay tribute to them!