Peng Dehuai (1898-1974)

Chinese proletarian revolutionary, military strategist; one of the founders and main leaders of the People’s Liberation Army. Courtesy name Peng Dehua, also named Peng Shichuan, native of Xiangtan County, Hunan Province, born on October 24, 1898. In 1916, he joined the Hunan Warlords Army and hated and opposed the imperialist aggression and the cruel rule of the warlords and sprouted the thought of enriching the country and strengthening the army. In 1922, he was admitted to the Hunan Military Academy Army, after graduation, Peng Dehuai returned to the Hunan Warlords Army to serve as the platoon commander, company commander and battalion commander and even became regiment commander. In 1926, his unit and troops were reorganized into the Fifth Division of the National Revolutionary Army, and participated in the Northern Expedition War, in these days; he got acquainted with the Duan Dechang, a CPC member, sympathized with the progressive forces, and began to accept communist thoughts. In April 1928, he joined the CPC. On July 22, he led the Pingjiang Uprising with Teng Daiyuan and Huang Gonglue, and formed the Fifth Corps of the Chinese Workers’ and Peasants’ Red Army and served as the commander of this army. He successfully led his troops to fight for several months in the Hunan, Hubei, and Jiangxi provinces and established a revolutionary base area along the border of the three provinces. In December of the same year, he led his troops to Jinggang Mountains and join the Fourth Red Army led by Zhu De and Mao Zedong. Between 1930 and 1934, he participated in the command ranks of the Red Army and won four battles against KMT’s encirclement and suppression campaigns. During the battle against the fifth encirclement and suppression campaign, he gradually realized the harm caused by Wang Ming’s “Left” deviation dogmatism. During this period, he successively served as the Vice-Chairman of the Central Revolutionary Military Commission of the Chinese Soviet Republic, the deputy commander of the First Front Army of the Red Army, and alternate member of the CPC Central Committee. In October 1934, with his troops Peng Dehuai took part in the Long March and supported Mao Zedong’s correct ideas at the famous enlarged meeting of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee held in Zunyi. In 1935, he resolutely fought against the separatist forces led by Zhang Guotao. After he successfully arrived in northern Shaanxi, he served successively as commander of the Shaanxi-Gansu Detachment of the Chinese Workers’ and Peasants’ Red Army, commander of the First Front Army of the Red Army; Commander-in-Chief of the Anti-Japanese Vanguard Army of the Chinese Workers’ and Peasants’ Red Army; Commander-in-Chief and political commissar of the Western Expeditionary Army; he led the Red Army both in the “Eastern Expedition” and “Western Expedition”. During the Anti-Japanese War, he served as Deputy Commander-in- chief of the Eighth Route Army, Deputy Commander-in-chief of the Eighteenth Group Army, acting secretary of the Northern Bureau of the CPC Central Committee; Vice-Chairman and the chief of staff of the Central Military Commission. During this period, Peng Dehuai led the Eighth Route Army to establish a Anti-Japanese War Base Area behind the enemy lines in North China and achieved a great moral boasting victory in Pingxingguan. In the autumn of 1940, he led the Hundred Regiments Offensive and won the battle. During the War of Liberation (1946-1949), he served as deputy commander-in-chief of the Chinese PLA; Commander-in-Chief and political commissar of the First Field Army, and fought in the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia area to defend Yan’an and liberated the Northwest provinces of China. After the founding of the New China, he successively served as the First secretary of the Northwest Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, Chairman of the Northwest Military and Political Commission, Vice-Chairman of the Central Military Commission, Vice-Chairman of the Revolutionary Military Commission of the Central People’s Government, Vice-Chairman of the National Defense Commission, Vice Premier of the State Council and the Minister of National Defense, throughout his career, he paid great attention on the modernization of the armed forces. In October 1950, he was appointed as the Commander and concurrently Political Commissar of the Chinese People’s Volunteers in led the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea. In 1955, Peng Dehuai was awarded as the Marshal of the People’s Republic of China. In July 1959, he was wrongly criticized at the enlarged meeting of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee (Lushan Conference) and was removed from the post of Defense Minister. In 1965, he served as the third deputy director of the “Three Lines” Construction Committee of the Southwest Bureau of the Central Committee of the CPC, responsible for the logistics supply of coal and natural gas in Sichuan and Guizhou provinces.

He was elected as a member of the Seventh and Eighth Central Committees (1945-1959) of the CPC and as a member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee. Peng Dehuai was brutally persecuted in the “Cultural Revolution” and detained for several years. In 1970, Peng was formally trialed and sentenced to life imprisonment, and he died in prison on November 29, 1974 in Beijing at the age of 76. In 1978, the Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh CPC Central Committee has posthumously formally rehabilitated him. Peng Dehuai’s main works are collected in Selected Works on Military Affairs of Peng Dehuai.