Liu Bocheng

Liu Bocheng, 1955

Liu Bocheng ( Chinese  劉伯承  /  刘柏承 , Pinyin Liú Bóchéng , W.-G. Liu Po-ch'eng ; born December 4, 1892 in Kai County (then Sichuan Province ); † October 7, 1986 in Beijing ) was an important communist Army leaders during the Chinese Civil War .

Life

Liu Bocheng was born to poor farmers in southwest Sichuan Province .

Liu began his military career as a mercenary in a student militia that was founded after the Xinhai Revolution in 1911 to defend the young republic. He lost an eye in the battle against the troops of Yuan Shikai in 1916, which earned him the nickname One-Eyed Dragon .

He reached a high position within the hierarchy of the Kuomintang Forces as the commanding general of Sichuan Province. In 1926 he joined the Chinese Communist Party . In the wake of the internal political rift between the Kuomintang and the communists, he turned his back on the KMT army and became one of the founding members of the Chinese Red Army. In the civil war against the Kuomintang, he served as the military commander of the Nanchang uprising . After its failure, he emigrated to the Soviet Union at the behest of the party . Here he studied at the MW Frunze Military Academy , learned Russian and was the first translator of Russian-language military science texts into Chinese.

After his return to civil war-plagued China in 1930, he served as head of the Red Army Military Academy in Jiangxi and as chief of staff of the Central Military Commission of the Red Army. During the Long March he continued to function as chief of staff and as commander of the marching column accompanying the party's central committee . Liu Bocheng supported Mao Tse Tung during the Long March to assert his claim to leadership within the party.

With the Japanese attack on China, the Kuomintang and the communists interrupted their civil war in order to jointly defend themselves against the external enemy. During the war, Liu Bocheng acted as commander of the 129th Division and took part with her in the Hundred Regiments Offensive . He developed an employment relationship with Deng Xiaoping , who was the division's political commissioner. The 129th Division was later expanded to form the second field army , Liu led this army in the fight against the Kuomintang troops from Chiang Kai-shek . He led the communist attempt to break out of Shanxi and established anti-Japanese bases in the mountains near the Shanxi, Hebei and Henan borders . After Japan surrendered in 1945, Liu commanded several field armies and initiated the communists' change of strategy from guerrilla tactics to counterattack. In June 1947 he led with Deng Xiaoping the attack on the Dabie Mountains north of the Kuomintang capital Nanjing , the Huaihai campaign and the crossing of the Yangtze River . These maneuvers destroyed the Kuomintang's central army and forced them to retreat to southern China.

As at 1 October 1949 Mao on the Tiananmen Square , the People's Republic of China proclaimed, Liu was among the participants of the ceremony. Subsequently, he was appointed deputy secretary of the CCP's Southwest Office in Chongqing, whose first secretary was Deng Xiaoping . He later held high military posts such as President and Political Commissar of the People's Liberation Army Military Academy , Deputy Chairman of the Military Commission of the CCP Central Committee, and member of several standing committees of the National People's Congress and several Central Committees of the CCP . In 1955, Liu was appointed Marshal of the People's Republic of China.

With regard to the establishment of the People's Liberation Army, Liu Bocheng protested against copying the Soviet Army and called for the establishment of a modern army based on the experience of the anti-Japanese war and the civil war. Here he was defeated by Mao, who called for the army to be built on the Soviet model. In 1956, Liu Bocheng was replaced as head of the military academy by Ye Jianying and had to practice self-criticism in public. He kept his other posts in the party and the armed forces, however, was sidelined in terms of power politics. At the time of the Cultural Revolution , Liu Bocheng was completely blind due to old age and was spared political reprisals. In the 1970s he supported Deng Xiaoping's rise against the Gang of Four and its far-reaching economic reforms. He died as the oldest of the commanders of the Long March .

Web links

Commons : Liu Bocheng  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Obituary for Liu Bocheng in the New York Times, October 10, 1986 (Retrieved September 23, 2014)
• Photos by Liu Bocheng
• Marshal Liu Bocheng

Note: This article places the family name before the person's first name. This is the usual order in Chinese. Liu is the family name here, Bocheng is the first name.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d e} Dr. Xiaobing Li: Liu Bocheng in Xiaobing Li: China at War - An Encyclopedia. Oxford, 2012, pp. 239-242