Build the Armed Forces Through Political Work

The fundamental principles and characteristic advantages of the Communist Party of China in building and managing the army are that the Party firmly grasps the fundamentals of the army ideologically and politically. The “Gutian Conference” in December 1929 established this important principle. After the failure of the first domestic revolutionary war in 1927 and the breakdown of the Kuomintang-Communist cooperation, the Communist Party of China began to explore to independently build armed forces, thinking that it is necessary to build “the army of workers and peasants who launched a real revolution”, and “this is our Party's responsibility of top priority”. This is the preliminary idea of the CPC's building armed forces through political work. In the autumn of 1927, Mao Zedong led the “Sanwan Reorganization”, improved the grass-roots Party organization of the army, established and guaranteed the Party's leadership over the army from the organizational leadership system through setting up Party group at the squad or platoon level, Party branch at the company level, Party committee at the battalion and regiment level, and Party representative at all levels above the company, which laid a preliminary foundation for building a new type of people's army under the leadership of the Communist Party of China.

In December 1929, under the chairmanship of Mao Zedong, the 9th Congress of the Fourth Army Party of the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army was held in Gutian Village, Shanghang County, Fujian. The Meeting passed the “Resolution of the Nineth Congress of the Fourth Army of the Red Army of the Communist Party of China”, the “Gutian Conference Resolution”, which formed the systematic thinking of the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army led by the Communist Party of China on building armed forces through political work. The principles and ideas of building armed forces through political work continue to be upheld and develop in the new period. The principles of building armed forces through political work clearly stipulate that the nature and purpose of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army are: the people ’s army created and led by the Communist Party of China, armed with Marxism-Leninism, Mao Zedong Thought, and the socialist theoretical system with Chinese characteristics, and the armed force of the People’s Republic of China, the strong pillar of the people's democratic dictatorship; standing closely with the people and serving the people wholeheartedly is the sole purpose of this army.

The important position and role of the army's political work: political work is essentially the work of the Party leading and mastering the army. Political work is the special skill, the most prominent characteristic and the greatest strength of the people’s army. The biggest difference between people’s army and all other types of troops, is an important guarantee for maintaining the nature, purpose, and character of the people’s army. The political work of revolutions led by the CPC is the lifeline of the revolutionary army, and forging the soul of the army, that is, adhering to the absolute leadership of the Communist Party of China over the army is the core task of political work. The Communist Party of China always adheres to the principles of building armed forces through political work, and always emphasizes the adherence to the Party's absolute leadership over the army. In October 2014, at the Political Work Conference of PLA held in Gutian, Xi Jinping made a comprehensive deployment of strengthening and improving the political work of the army under the new situation, pointed out the direction of adhering to the principles of building armed forces through political work, clarified the era theme of the military political work, put forward the general requirements for strengthening and improving the military political work under the new situation, established a new starting point for the Party to build the army ideologically and politically, and further solved the problem of "restart" towards the future.

The formation and development of the idea of building armed forces through political work have greatly enriched and developed the Marxist military theories. It is the precious spiritual wealth of the Communist Party of China and the people's army under its leadership, and the fundamental guarantee of being able to fight and win battles. Only by adhering to the principles of building armed forces through political work can we maintain the nature, character and style of the people's army and make it remain invincible.