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Political Profiles: Wang Hung-wen and Li Teh-sheng

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 February 2009

Parris H. Chang
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Extract

The spectacular rise of Wang Hung-wen, who was elected as second Vice-Chairman of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) during the Tenth Party Congress in August 1973 and now officially ranks number three in the Party hierarchy behind only Chairman Mao Tse-tung and the first Vice-Chairman, Chou En-lai, has aroused a great deal of speculation. The biographical sketch below is an attempt to consider, and answer where possible, some of the questions raised about his personal and political background.

Type
Research Note
Information
The China Quarterly , Volume 57 , March 1974 , pp. 124 - 132
Copyright
Copyright © The China Quarterly 1974

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References

* I wish to acknowledge the support, in the preparation of this note, of the Institute for the Arts and Humanistic Studies of the Pennsylvania State University.

1. Acclaimed by Mao as “China's first Marxist-Leninist big-character poster,” Nieh's poster was broadcast over Peking Radio on 1 June 1966, and reproduced by the People's Daily the following day with a favourable commentary. Nieh became the Deputy Director of the Peking Municipal Revolutionary Committee in April 1967, an alternative member of the Central Committee in 1969 and, during 1967–68, was in control of Peking University, but she dropped out of sight after 1 October 1970. When I visited Peking University in October 1972 and inquired about Nieh's whereabouts, I was told that she had committed a series of grave political mistakes and was undergoing re-education.

2. Jen-min hua-pao (People's Pictorial), No. 11 (11 1968), p. 1Google Scholar .

3. Ibid.

4. See the People's Daily, 12 July, 20 September, 3 October, and 6 December 1967, for Wang's articles and public statements.

5. Wang's presence in Peking was first reported by New China News Agency on 13 September 1972, when he appeared in the company of “Party and government leaders.” Wang was listed after members of the Politburo but before Keng Piao, Director of the CCP Department for International Liaison. The position he held in the central Party apparatus prior to the Tenth Party Congress cannot be determined - he may have been a member of the secretarial team under the Politburo (a body equivalent to the former Party Secretariat).

6. There is an unconfirmed report that Wang Hung-wen was instrumental in nullifying Lin Piao's scheme to assasinate Mao and in saving Mao's life in September 1971.

7. This and other biographical data on Li Teh-sheng below are taken from Huang Chen-hsin, Mao's Generals (Hong Kong: Research Institute of Contemporary History, 1968), p. 178Google Scholar, and Studies on Chinese Communism (Taipei), VI: 8 (08 1972), pp. 93–100Google Scholar.

8. See, for example, the People's Daily, 28 February, 1964.

9. Prior to the Cultural Revolution, an Army commander usually had to serve first as the chief-of-staff or a deputy commander of a military district before he could be promoted to commander, and promotion was very much according to seniority. In 1966, most commanders of military districts held the rank of lieutenant general and only a few of them were members of the Central Committee. Likewise, a military district commander had to serve as deputy commander or in some major staff position in the headquarters of a military region which has jurisdiction over a few provinces before he could be considered for promotion to the commander of a military region.