After the establishment of the Chinese Communist Party in 1949, the chairman of the “Central People’s Government” was initially set up, and the state chairmanship began in 1954. Between 1966 and 1975, the post of State President was vacant for a long time because Liu Shaoqi, who had served as President, was persecuted to death, and no one served as President from early 1975 to December 1982 because the State President was formally abolished during this period and was not restored until the end of 1982.
In the eyes of the world, as vice-presidents of the Communist Party, they had enormous power and could do things that ordinary people could not do and enjoy a life that ordinary people could not hope for, so where could they or their families have any fear of imprisonment or even life? However, the fact is just the opposite, the chairmanship is not a safe deposit box, in the land of China without any legal protection, except for the lawless Mao Zedong, who was determined to get rid of the party rivals, except for Li Jishen and Zhang Lan, who were bailed out by Mao and died early, the above-mentioned national chairmen and vice chairmen were more or less persecuted by Mao and the Chinese Communist Party, and some even lost their lives. It is worth mentioning them separately. Since Zhu De has already been introduced in “Ten Marshals of the Chinese Communist Party who were persecuted”, this article is about Liu Shaoqi, Song Qingling, Gao Gang and Dong Biwu.
Middle: Song Qingling
Song Qingling before the establishment of the Chinese Communist Party
On October 1, 1949, the President of the Republic of China Chiang Kai-shek wrote in his diary on that day: “The Communists have established a pseudo-People’s Government in Beiping on October 1, with Mao Zedong as Chairman and six Vice-Chairmen, of whom Song Qingling is one, the Prime Minister’s spirit in heaven will be disturbed, the national traitor and family rebellion is even worse than the Communists, the pain is extreme!
Soong Ching-ling, the vice chairman of the “Central People’s Government”, who made Chiang Kai-shek saddened, served as vice chairman and other senior positions from 1959 to 1966 after the CPC set up the national chairman and vice chairman. This is clearly contrary to the words of Soong Qingling in January 1949 that she “refuses to accept any position in any government of China under any circumstances”.
As the wife of Sun Yat-sen, the “Founding Father” of the Republic of China, Soong’s high position in the Communist regime was closely related to her betrayal of Sun Yat-sen’s “Three Principles of the People” by secretly joining the Communist International and accepting its orders to support the Communist Party, and taking “great credit” for the Communist Party’s seizure of power.
For example, during the Communist civil war, Soong called on the U.S. government to stop assisting Chiang C.C.C.’s Nationalist government, but provided the CCP with all kinds of materials, medicines and equipment needed for military hospitals and supported the CCP’s overthrow of the ROC government.
In 2009, Xinhua reported that in May 1946, under the banner of distributing UN relief supplies, Song Qingling organized more than 700 ships full of medical equipment needed for military hospitals to be delivered to Chen Yi and Su Yu’s New Fourth Army in northern Jiangsu under the name of the China Welfare Foundation.
By 1948, the China Welfare Foundation under the leadership of Soong Ching Ling had helped the Communist Party establish eight “international peace hospitals” and 42 branches in eight “liberated areas” across the country, with a total of 11,800 beds, dozens of traveling medical teams and several Dozens of traveling medical teams and several large-scale pharmaceutical factories. The amount of cash donated was as much as 2 billion yuan.
In August 1947, when Chiang Kai-shek’s government was in a state of military defeat and was seeking peace talks with the Chinese Communist Party to save the country, Soong Ching-ling’s unique position made her the best candidate for the Nationalist government to broker peace talks. Song Meiling also went to Shanghai to meet with Song Qingling in the hope that she would help the Kuomintang solve the problem, but Song Qingling refused.
Following the Chinese Communist Party
However, while rejecting Chiang Kai-shek, Song Qingling said in a letter to Mao Zedong, Liu Shaoqi, Zhu De and Zhou Enlai on February 20, 1949: “My spirit is to follow your cause forever. I am convinced that under your heroic and wise leadership, this chapter of history – which had begun long ago then and was unfortunately blocked 23 years ago – will be completed gloriously in the near future.” (Selected Works of Soong Ching-ling, upper volume)
In June of the same year, when the Chinese Communist forces occupied Shanghai, the CPC Central Committee sent Deng Yingchao and Liao Meng-sheng to Shanghai carrying personal letters from Mao and Zhou to invite Soong Ching-ling north to attend the Chinese Communist Party’s CPPCC meeting in Beijing. As an invited delegate, she was elected as a member of the First National Committee of the Chinese Communist Party’s Political Consultative Conference and Vice-Chairman of the Central People’s Government of the People’s Republic of China, and was elected as the Honorary Chairman of the All-China Democratic Women’s Federation. Honorary Chairman of the All-China Democratic Women’s Federation”, etc.
The reason why Mao and the CCP gave Song Qingling a very high status was to make use of her special status and influence as the “mother of the nation” to unite the war at home and abroad and to whitewash the CCP. Throughout her life, Song Qingling was a political vase and a tool of unification for the CCP.
Evidence of joining the Communist Party
Interestingly, the Communist Party’s official media did not publicly report that Song Qingling joined the Communist Party, but historical data proves that this was not an empty story.
According to the recollection of CCP leader Liao Chengzhi, in May 1933, Song Qingling suddenly and mysteriously came to his home to meet with him secretly and told him clearly, “I am here on behalf of the highest party.” This supreme party was the Communist International. At that time, Song Qingling asked Liao Chengzhi two questions: “First, can the secret work in Shanghai still be maintained? Second, the list of traitors you know.” After receiving the answer, Song Qingling quickly left. Liao Chengzhi wrote: “Although nearly 50 years have passed, I remember every minute of that brief period of less than half an hour clearly.” (Liao Chengzhi, “My Memories”) It is not difficult to judge that Song Qingling, who came to meet secretly on behalf of the “highest party” at this time, had already joined the Communist Party.
Moreover, a document from the archives of the Communist International, which was made public after the collapse of the Soviet Union, shows that Song Qingling had not only requested to join the Party, but had already joined it in the early 1930s. This document is a memorandum of a conversation between a representative of the International Liaison Bureau in the Far East and the head of the International Liaison Bureau in May 1934.
The last part of the conversation specifically mentions the relationship between the Far East Bureau of the Communist International and Soong Ching Ling. The reporters stated: “On the question of Sun Xinlin (Mrs. Sun). She is a good comrade and can stay in the Party. However, it was a big mistake to absorb her into the Party. It was the delegate (meaning the political representative previously sent to China by the Comintern) who proposed to accept her into the Party. …… Once she became a member of the Party, she would have lost her peculiar value.”
One of the important orders that Soong carried out from the Comintern was to rescue the spies in Shanghai, Paul and Gertrude Niu Lan, who had Swiss passports. In June 1931, the Niu Lan couple was arrested by the Shanghai Public Constabulary and transported to Nanjing in August.
Niu Lan and his wife were so important to the Comintern that the Soviet Union and the Chinese Communist Party immediately launched an emergency rescue effort. In July of that year, Song Qingling returned to Shanghai from Germany via Moscow to attend the funeral of her mother. On the way, she was instructed by Stalin to intercede with Chiang Kai-shek to exchange Niu Lan and his wife for Chiang Ching-kuo, who was detained in the Soviet Union, but Chiang refused.
The book “Chiang’s Secret Files and the Truth about Chiang Kai-shek” by mainland scholar Yang Tianshi quotes Chiang’s diary entry of December 16, 1931: “The Soviet Communist Party’s Eastern Minister, whose guilt is already very clear. Mrs. Sun wanted to force me to release him and tempted him with the repatriation of Jingguo. I would rather let Jingguo throw himself into the wilderness or let Soviet Russia kill him, than to exchange a criminal who had harmed the country for his own son. How dare I hope to be spared? But seek the law is not destroyed by me, the country is not sold for me, in order to preserve the name of my parents, not to miss this life is a few. A small area of Ziyin, not enough to oppose my feelings.” From the diary can be seen, for the sake of the country, for the sake of the rule of law, Chiang Kai-shek would rather sacrifice his own son, but never make this deal. This shows that Chiang is a man.
And Yang Tianshi also believes that “this condition was made through Song Qingling, which also shows the close relationship between Song and the Moscow side. Some materials say that Song Qingling was a secret member of the party developed by the Communist International. This is possible.”
After being rejected by Chiang Kai-shek, Song Qingling continued to publicly slander the Kuomintang, visited the Niu Lan couple in prison herself, and hired a lawyer from Switzerland to defend them, while setting up an alliance organization, making herself chairman and organizing a rescue committee. Since the response from the society was not great, the organization was expanded and renamed as “Civil Rights Protection”, and a group of heavy-weight cultural and educational celebrities joined the organization, but its goal was still to rescue Niu Lan and her husband. Because the name did not match the reality, the alliance soon collapsed. The Niu Lan couple was not released until 1937, after the outbreak of the war, at the urging of Song Qingling and others.
Another evidence that Song Qingling was in the same “trench” as the Communists is a letter she wrote in January 1937 to Wang Ming, the leader of the Chinese Communist Party, who was in Moscow at the time. In the letter, while accusing Smedley of leaking secrets to the outside world, Soong also revealed her true identity as a worker for the Communist International. For example, when Song defended the perfidy of her “comrades” in the Communist Party, Song said to her: “If I told you that Zhou Enlai had told me that you had sent them $50,000 not long ago, would you still deny that your comrades had betrayed you? And he also said to both of us (Song and I) that we could get in touch with the representatives of the Red Army through you.”
Since the CCP was not aware of her secret membership in the Comintern, Soong had raised the issue of joining the Party with the CCP, but Mao said that her role outside the Party was greater and thus allowed her to remain outside the Party.
Mao responded coldly and with a warning
Song Qingling, who joined the Communist Party (Comintern) and gained a special status within the CCP, was indeed highly valued by Mao and the CCP in the early days. However, as the CCP regime and Mao’s position became more consolidated, Song’s role gradually declined and she began to be treated coldly and her opinions were not accepted.
For example, Song Qingling was very puzzled by several political campaigns launched by the CCP and Mao, and once criticized and questioned them.
In November 1955, Song Qingling wrote to Mao: “I do not understand the proposed reform of industry and commerce. The Communist Party had promised the business community long-term coexistence and protection of the interests of the industrial and commercial sector. Hasn’t this turned out to be a self-fulfilling promise? The capitalists have already become suspicious and fearful of the Communist Party’s policy, and many of them regret and complain.” Mao instructed, “Vice Chairman Song has an opinion to speak on behalf of the capitalists.”
In 1957 she wrote again to the CPC Central Committee, “The Party Central Committee called for a big sound and release, why did it close again? The Communist Party is not afraid of the eight million armies of the Kuomintang or the U.S. imperialists, so how can it be worried about the people overthrowing the Party leadership and the people’s government? The Communist Party should dare to accept criticism from people from all walks of life. Most of the critics are patriotic and love the Party, and some democratic party members have made sacrifices of family and personal fame and fortune for the liberation of new China. How can some young intellectuals in their twenties and thirties become anti-Party and anti-socialist one day? I do not understand this movement, I thought about it for more than two months, still can not figure out ……”
During the Cultural Revolution, Song Qingling wrote seven letters to Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist Party, expressing her incomprehension and disgust with the Cultural Revolution and her extreme disappointment with the Communist Party. She said, “I don’t understand culture, and I say that novels are all political and poisonous. I am confused, and overnight, some of my colleagues who work with me have become capitalists, anti-party groups, ambitious people, cattle and snake gods. The central government wants me to learn to criticize and expose Liu Shaoqi, I will not do it, Chairman Liu Shaoqi worked in the Party Central Committee for 30 or 40 years, today would be a traitor, traitor! I do not believe that a traitor traitor has been the president of the country for seven years, is the constitution still valid now? How can you arrest people indiscriminately, fight people indiscriminately, and force people to die? The Party Central Committee has to come out and speak. This kind of lawlessness, hurting one’s own comrades and people, is a crime. What is the reason for our outstanding cadres coming from the battle with the Kuomintang only to die in their own ranks?”
Mao Zedong said to this “Madam Sun”, who no longer had much use, “If you don’t want to stay in the country, you can go outside. At this point, Song Qingling was naturally ashamed to return to Taiwan, the seat of government of the Republic of China, which she had subverted. She could only shut up and live in pain and helplessness.
Soong Ching-ling’s parents’ graves were smashed
But one of the most exciting events for Song Qingling was when the Red Guards in Shanghai smashed the graves of her parents in the Universal Cemetery during the Cultural Revolution initiated by Mao.
The biography of Soong Ching-ling states, “When the photos of the vandalized cemetery were sent from Shanghai to Beijing, the staff around Soong Ching-ling saw for the first time that she could not support herself mentally and cried out. Liao Mengcheng sent the photos to Zhou Enlai. Premier Zhou ordered the Shanghai authorities to restore Song’s tomb immediately, and took photos and sent them to Song Qingling after completion. However, it was not all restored as it was. The original tombstone listed the names of all six children, while the new tombstone had only Song Qingling on it.”
Only after the Cultural Revolution was the tombstone replaced and fully restored, but the tomb was no longer the same.
Recent Comments