Китай: пресса на сегодня
- Китай отчитался по экономическому развитию за полугодие: рост ВВП составил 7,4проц. Данные Государственного статистического управления КНР свидетельствуют: благодаря стабильному экономическому развитию, за шесть месяцев по стране создано около семи миллионов новых рабочих мест. Главным производителем валового внутреннего продукта в Китае стала сфера услуг: она обеспечивает 46,6 проц от общего объема добавленной стоимости. А главным локомотивом развития китайской экономики назван подъем внутреннего потребления, который обеспечил 52,4 проц от роста ВВП. Действительно, розничные продажи по стране за полугодие подскочили на 12,1 проц по сравнению с показателем аналогичного периода прошлого года, достигнув отметки в 2,02 трлн долларов. Быстрее всего развивается сектор онлайн-продаж, который показал рост аж в 48,3 проц.
- Китайских журналистов поголовно заставят подписывать документы о неразглашении. Соответствующее постановление приняло Госуправление КНР по делам печати, радио, кино и телевидения. Соглашения о неразглашении будут подписываться при продлении журналистских удостоверений. В последний раз поднебесным репортерам удостоверения переоформляли в 2009 году. Эти документы действительны по 30 октября 2014 года. Соответственно, к этой дате все обладатели новых журналистских "корочек" уже будут связаны обязательствами о неразглашении. Напомним, что власти начали закручивать гайки в медиа-сфере с середины июня, когда Госуправление КНР по делам печати, радио, кино и телевидения запретило сотрудникам СМИ без разрешения начальства публиковать критические замечания или в частном порядке создавать интернет-платформы для публикации материалов критического содержания, а также выступать с подобными речами на форумах и лекциях. Чуть позже - 30 июня - последовал новый циркуляр, запрещающий журналистам "хранить и распространять конфиденциальную информацию и информацию, являющуюся государственной тайной". Комментируя эти постановления, законодатели отметили: "Поскольку все медиа-организации в Китае принадлежат государству, журналисты должны рассматриваться как госслужащие и следовать соответствующим правилам". Не могу не отметить, что среди всех этих драконовских нововведений затесалась одна "либеральная" статейка: журналистские корочки с октября в экспериментальном порядке начнут выдавать сотрудникам нескольких новостных веб-порталов. Напомним, что крупные частные новостные веб-порталы в Поднебесной, вроде Sina, до сих пор не являются официально зарегистрированными СМИ и, соответственно, не имеют права производить собственный новостной контент. В связи с этим они в-основном занимались только компиляцией новостей из огромного количества китайских медиа.
- Попытка группового самоубийства совершена 16 июля в Пекине у ворот редакции газеты "Чжунго цинняньбао" ("Китайская молодежь").
Семь человек выпили яду и улеглись на тротуаре помирать. Выяснилось, что самоубийцы приехали в Пекин из провинции Цзянсу. Они решили устроить суицид в знак протеста против политики местных властей, которые в добровольно-принудительном порядке выселяли людей из старых домов за мизерную компенсацию, не достигавшую и трети от рыночной стоимости жилья, для того, чтобы расчистить место под новые проекты девелоперов. В интернете ходят слухи, что петиционеры пытались подать жалобу еще в минувшем октябре, за что их без суда и следствия бросили в каталашку. Выйдя на свободу, ходоки не придумали лучшего способа обратить на себя внимание, чем наглотаться отравы и лечь умирать у подъезда одной из авторитетных национальных газет. Самоубийцы отправлены в больницу. Все выжили.
- В Синьцзяне запретили спички в рамках антитеррористической кампании. Лавочникам и владельцам магазинов приказано убрать этот товар с прилавков. У невыполнивших распоряжение спецслужбы изъяли и сожгли 20 тыс коробков. В правоохранительных органах пояснили: селитра со спичек используется террористами для изготовления детонаторов. О бесчинствах бомбистов в уйгурятнике знает весь мир. 30 апреля на железнодорожной станции в Урумчи прогремел взрыв, унесший три жизни и поколечивший 79 человек. 22 мая на центральном рынке административного центра СУАР произошел еще один крупный теракт: в результате взрыва самодельных бомб 39 человек погибли, 90 получили ранения.
- Китай: автобусы стали новой мишенью экстремистов? В Гуанчжоу 15 июля в вечерний час-пик взорвался автобус, следовавший по одному из наиболее оживленных маршрутов. В результате 20 пассажиров получили серьезные ожоги, двое погибли на месте. Список жертв может возрасти: еще двое человек находятся в критическом состоянии. В полиции не исключают, а сарафанное радио - так просто уверенно в том, что причина взрыва - не технические неполадки, а очередной акт экстремизма. В нынешнем месяце в Народной Республике автобусы уже поджигали. Пятого июля подобный инцидент произошел в городе Ханчжоу. Тогда пострадали 32 человека, но, к счастью, никто не погиб. Поджог совершил некий 34-летний гражданин по не названным пока мотивам.
- Китай назвал первые госкорпорации, подлежащие частичной приватизации. "В экспериментальном порядке" в руки частного капитала отойдет часть фондов Китайской национальной корпорации стройматериалов и Китайской национальной фармацефтической корпорации. Процесс предполагает также ввод в совет директоров этих холдингов представителей частного бизнеса. Если эксперимент пройдет нормально, приватизация поднебесных госпредприятий будет набирать обороты. Напомним: чуть ранее премьер Госсовета КНР Ли Кэцян сообщил, что Китай готовит довольно объемный список госкомпаний, подлежащих частичной приватизации. Это очередной шаг по либерализации национальной экономики. "Мы открываем двери для негосударственного капитала, предоставим частным фирмам больше инвестиционных возможностей, более широкое поле для игры", - отметил глава китайского правительства. Он напомнил, что в этих целях власти также урезают список инвестпроектов, требующих одобрения Госсовета КНР. В минувшем году он сократился на 416 пунктов, в нынешнем - будет урезан еще на 200. Напомним, на минувшей неделе Госсовет КНР сообщил: процесс либерализации национального рынка будет завершен к 2020 году. К тому времени планируется открыть для частного капитала абсолютное большинство секторов экономики кроме тех, которые войдут в составляемый властями "negative list".
- "Дисквалифицирован за обоссывание стены": организаторы пекинского марафона вводят новые правила для бегунов.
Участников ежегодного 42-километрового забега будут снимать с дистанции за уринацию на забор или стену, особенно если стена эта относится к памятнику архитектуры. Решение принято после скандала, произошедшего во время пекинского марафона в минувшем году: один из журналистов запечатлел на фотопленку, как спортсмены обоссали всю стену одного из древних пекинских храмов. Общественность негодовала. Сами участники забега в ответ попросили расставить вдоль маршрута мобильные туалеты. Другие обозначили, что в большинстве стран мира писать где попало марафонцам не запрещают, ибо многие бегут на время и не могут позволить себе делать лишний крюк в поисках туалета. Пекинский марафон-2014 состоится 19 октября.
- Самый большой в мире дьюти-фри откроется на острове Хайнань. Он будет расположен в городе Санья в торговом центре Haitang Bay, который откроет двери 1 сентября. Мега-дьюти-фри будет занимать больше половины общей площади нового комплекса: 45 тыс из 70 тыс кв.м.
- Издание China Daily начало публикацию серии материалов, посвященных грядущему празднованию 70-летия Победы над фашизмом. Первая статья рассказывает о военной академии Вампу
When he was 14 years old, Chen Hanfeng discovered that everything he had been told about his father was untrue. "It was hot summer day in 1958. My mother came to my school, hugged me, and said, 'Your father is dead. He's been dead for two years'.
Up until that point I had believed that he was fighting in the Korean War. For the past eight years, that had served as the explanation for his absence," said the 60-year-old, whose deep-set eyes never fail to arouse memories among those who knew his late father.
"It was plainly an excuse - the Korean War ended in 1953. But what could a child do? I had no choice but to believe that my father was still alive and well somewhere, until I was told to stop believing that," he said.
It would take another eight years for Chen to discover the full truth about his father. "My father was born in Hanoi, Vietnam, in 1908. But before his death from lung cancer in 1956, he had been made a major general by both the Socialist Republic of Vietnam and the People's Republic of China," said Chen, referring to the man known as Nguyen Son in Vietnam and Hong Shui in China. "If my father is a legend, then his legend really started at Whampoa, China's first modern military academy. He entered the academy in 1926, two years after it was founded in Guangzhou by the renowned revolutionary Sun Yat-sen."
According to Chen Yuhuan, a historian and Whampoa expert, between the mid-1920s and the mid-1940s, the academy was a beacon for young people, not only in China but also across the whole East and Southeast Asian region. "Back then, the situation in China reminded those patriotic youths of the suffering and depredations of their own motherlands. What they saw at Whampoa - founded by Sun to unify China by force - was a future they aspired to for their own war-torn countries."
The Soviet experience
But the instructors were just as important as the students, especially the instructors from what was then the Soviet Union. "The Chinese Nationalists, then led by Sun, and the Soviets were brought together by their own visions and ambitions. The Chinese desperately needed money, weaponry and expertise for the new military academy, while the Soviets were enthusiastic about spreading the ideas and influence of the Comintern," Chen Yuhuan said. "They also greatly facilitated the cooperation between the Kuomintang (the Chinese Nationalist Party) and the Chinese Communist Party, giving Whampoa a prominent place in the history of both parties."
About 100 Russians are thought to have taught at Whampoa between 1924 and 1926, and Chen Yuhuan credits them with laying the groundwork for the academy. "They introduced ideology into the training of the officer corps," he said. "Given China's long feudal history and its more recent efforts to suppress the violent warlords that fought each other for control of the north of the country, it was of the utmost importance to instill a sense of loyalty in the soldiers' minds. Not loyalty toward a specific person, but toward a strong and democratic republic."
However, despite their emphasis on ideology, the Soviet instructors were anything but idealistic. "The majority of those sent to China had fought in the Russian Civil War, and they made sure that their hard-learned lessons were not wasted," Chen Yuhuan said. "They helped to turn out a crop of students every six month, using a curriculum that was tightly built around these men's future performances on the field of battle."
They even took the classroom to the frontline, according to amateur historian Cun Meng, whose great-grandfather taught at Whampoa in the early days, and whose grandfather attended the academy in the early 1940s. "No armchair generals, those Russians were brave soldiers and brilliant strategists who had participated in almost every military campaign launched by the Nationalists against the warlords between 1924 and 1926," the 38-year-old said.
Although the Soviet instructors were disciplinarians, that doesn't mean they didn't have their own "hobbies", to use Cun's word. "They would get up really early for morning drill, far earlier than the students. But outside the classroom, they were heavy drinkers with a soft spot for alcohol. My guess is that both had a lot to do with the forbidding climate of their native land, which, in retrospect, only made their stay in subtropical Guangzhou even more remarkable," said Cun, who still has an iron trunk his great-grandfather was given by a Soviet colleague.
Some of the instructors became minor celebrities on both sides of the academy's walls. One of them was Vasily Blyukher, an outstanding figure for the Bolsheviks during the Russian Civil War. Blyukher arrived in China in 1924 under the code name "Galen", after his wife, Galina, and was a trusted adviser to Chiang Kai-shek, who became the Nationalist leader following Sun's death in March 1925. He was so well- known and popular at the time that Guangzhou people referred to his blond-haired, blue-eyed countrymen as "General Galen".
However, the "Galens" were forced to leave China in late 1926 when Chiang, who was also Whampoa's first commandant, began a purge of Chinese Communists, and by extension the Soviets, at the academy. However, the mass exodus didn't signal the end of foreign instructors at Whampoa.
A common cause
"Hard on the heels of the Russians came the Japanese and the Germans. This was not entirely surprising because many Kuomintang leaders, including Chiang, had studied at a military academy in Japan," said Chen Yu, who has written extensively about Whampoa's history.
However, the Japanese presence caused unease from the start, mainly because of the growing tensions between the two countries, which culminated in Japan's invasion of China in September 1931. "The leaders at Whampoa then looked to Europe for the world's most advanced military theories and weaponry. They bought heavily from Germany, the technological giant of Europe, and along with the German tanks and machine guns came the German instructors," he said.
But it didn't last. By the late 1930s, Germany had become increasingly preoccupied with its own ambitions, which would soon drag the world into war. As the German instructors headed home, China headed toward its inevitable conflict with the Japanese. The Communists and Nationalists joined forces, and former classmates from Whampoa, who had previously fought on different sides, discovered a common goal: to expel the invaders.
The Soviets returned briefly, but never in the same numbers as before, according to Chen Yu. "From 1937 to 1941, the Chinese basically fought the Japanese without outside assistance. It was a really hard time. Then came the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec 7, 1941, which brought the US into the war and turned the tables," he said. "The Americans began to assist China in its battle against Japan. The Flying Tigers (a mixed squadron of pilots from China and the US) may be the best-known unit, but military instructors were actually appearing at many Whampoa campuses - the academy had set up more than 20 branches in the unoccupied areas."
In the past decade, Wang Yi, a high school teacher turned Whampoa history enthusiast, has spoken with hundreds of World War II veterans. "The American instructors surfaced in the conversations, albeit briefly. A man who'd studied at the Whampoa branch in Xi'an recalled his first class with an American instructor. Instead of diving directly into a discussion about the war, the teacher spoke about George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, and the support the American public showed for the Chinese cause," the 55-year-old said.
"It's worth noting that most of the students at Whampoa's Xi'an branch had come from northeastern China, which was overrun by the Japanese in 1932. Bereaved and homeless, they needed a big injection of hope and confidence to carry on during the most critical moment of the prolonged conflict. It seems to me that the American instructor understood that."
Although interpreters were needed to get the message through, some of the students were gifted linguists, especially those from neighboring Asian countries, many of whom, including Hong Shui, had traveled widely before entering Whampoa.
According to Chen Hanfeng, his late father was following the footsteps of Ho Chi Minh, the founder of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. Fluent in Russian, English, French and Chinese, Ho Chi Minh came to China in 1924 to act as an interpreter for the Russian instructors, but also occasionally delivered lectures on socialism to his fellow Vietnamese at Whampoa.
"He later opened a class to train Vietnamese officers at Whampoa's Nanning branch, not far from the Sino-Vietnamese border," Chen Hanfeng said.
"Then there were the Koreans, who had set up a provisional government on Chinese soil before starting to cultivate their own revolutionary forces, with 'Koreans-only' classes at several branches of the academy. The atrocities those countries endured at the hands of fascist Japan formed a tight bond between the young students," he added.
An 'excruciating' decision
Fluent in Chinese, with an unmistakable northern accent, Hong Shui's foreign background was never suspected, not even by his future wife. "When my mother first saw him in about 1937, my father was making an anti-Japanese speech, in Chinese, to a group of avid listeners. My mother later told me that she was deeply impressed, and that the last thing in her mind was that my father might be a foreigner," Chen Hanfeng said.
In January 1938, Hong Shui, who had joined the Chinese Communist Party in 1927, married Chen Jiange, who was also a committed communist. Chen Hanfeng was born in 1944.
A year later in November, 1945, while Chen's mother was pregnant with her second son, Hong Shui received an invitation from Ho Chi Minh, who had become the president of Vietnam. The Japanese had been defeated, but the French, who first colonized Vietnam in the late 19th century, had returned.
"My father answered the call and was made a general in the Vietnamese army. During his stay in Vietnam, news reached him that my mother, my younger brother and I had all died in the Chinese Civil War (1946-49) between the Communists and the Nationalists," he said.
The return
Although inconsolable, at Ho Chi Minh's request Hong Shui married a Vietnamese woman and returned to China in 1950, only to discover that his family was still alive.
"It was excruciating for them both, but my mother made the decision to end the marriage. Looking back, it was so obvious that she spent her whole life loving and protecting my father. She made sure he had a peaceful life during his final five years in China with his Vietnamese wife and children," said Chen Hanfeng. "And she made an effort to get my brother and me to believe that our father was always with us, wherever he might be.
"When she came to my school and told me the truth, it was, as she later told me, because my teacher had called to say I had been naughty," he said. "But I only got to know the whole story in the mid-1960s, during the Vietnam War, when we were invited to meet visiting Vietnamese officials.
In 1956, a year after he'd been made a major general by the Chinese government, Hong Shui was diagnosed with lung cancer. He insisted on returning to Vietnam, and passed away in October of that year. Chen Jiange died in 2012 at the age of 99.
Reflecting on the significance of his father's time at Whampoa, Chen Hanfeng said: "My father's Chinese name means 'flood'. He once likened himself to a torrent of water, charging irresistibly through life's rugged landscape, against all the odds. In the same way, Whampoa really was the place where all these different 'rivers' met and formed a strong torrent that changed the world once and for all."
- Марка ароматная: почта КНР последовала примеру производителей наших любимых китайских стелек из 90-х. В Поднебесной выпущена серия фруктовых марок, каждая из которых источает аромат изображенного на ней плода. Марка с яблочком пахнет яблочком, марка с грушкой, соответственно - грушкой. Технология изготовления этих почтовых знаков довольно проста: в краску подмешали ароматизаторы. Вероятно, в самом большом восторге от новинки - авторы любовных посланий: письма боле не надо надушивать парфюмами - они и так будут пахнуть приятственно с такими-то марками...
- Сказ про то, что теща - зло. A 49-year-old man surnamed Zhou, who drove to a bus station in Changsha on June 23 to pick up his girlfriend, thought he was stepping on the brake but actually stomped on the accelerator when he saw the woman's mother with her. The sight of the mother made him so nervous that he stepped on the wrong pedal, he told the police. His mistake caused one death and 11 injuries.
Повод для всенародного ликования на сегодня
16 июля 1966 года состоялось последнее купание председателя Мао в реке Янцзы. Великому кормчему было уже 73 года.
- Китайских журналистов поголовно заставят подписывать документы о неразглашении. Соответствующее постановление приняло Госуправление КНР по делам печати, радио, кино и телевидения. Соглашения о неразглашении будут подписываться при продлении журналистских удостоверений. В последний раз поднебесным репортерам удостоверения переоформляли в 2009 году. Эти документы действительны по 30 октября 2014 года. Соответственно, к этой дате все обладатели новых журналистских "корочек" уже будут связаны обязательствами о неразглашении. Напомним, что власти начали закручивать гайки в медиа-сфере с середины июня, когда Госуправление КНР по делам печати, радио, кино и телевидения запретило сотрудникам СМИ без разрешения начальства публиковать критические замечания или в частном порядке создавать интернет-платформы для публикации материалов критического содержания, а также выступать с подобными речами на форумах и лекциях. Чуть позже - 30 июня - последовал новый циркуляр, запрещающий журналистам "хранить и распространять конфиденциальную информацию и информацию, являющуюся государственной тайной". Комментируя эти постановления, законодатели отметили: "Поскольку все медиа-организации в Китае принадлежат государству, журналисты должны рассматриваться как госслужащие и следовать соответствующим правилам". Не могу не отметить, что среди всех этих драконовских нововведений затесалась одна "либеральная" статейка: журналистские корочки с октября в экспериментальном порядке начнут выдавать сотрудникам нескольких новостных веб-порталов. Напомним, что крупные частные новостные веб-порталы в Поднебесной, вроде Sina, до сих пор не являются официально зарегистрированными СМИ и, соответственно, не имеют права производить собственный новостной контент. В связи с этим они в-основном занимались только компиляцией новостей из огромного количества китайских медиа.
- Попытка группового самоубийства совершена 16 июля в Пекине у ворот редакции газеты "Чжунго цинняньбао" ("Китайская молодежь").
Семь человек выпили яду и улеглись на тротуаре помирать. Выяснилось, что самоубийцы приехали в Пекин из провинции Цзянсу. Они решили устроить суицид в знак протеста против политики местных властей, которые в добровольно-принудительном порядке выселяли людей из старых домов за мизерную компенсацию, не достигавшую и трети от рыночной стоимости жилья, для того, чтобы расчистить место под новые проекты девелоперов. В интернете ходят слухи, что петиционеры пытались подать жалобу еще в минувшем октябре, за что их без суда и следствия бросили в каталашку. Выйдя на свободу, ходоки не придумали лучшего способа обратить на себя внимание, чем наглотаться отравы и лечь умирать у подъезда одной из авторитетных национальных газет. Самоубийцы отправлены в больницу. Все выжили.
- В Синьцзяне запретили спички в рамках антитеррористической кампании. Лавочникам и владельцам магазинов приказано убрать этот товар с прилавков. У невыполнивших распоряжение спецслужбы изъяли и сожгли 20 тыс коробков. В правоохранительных органах пояснили: селитра со спичек используется террористами для изготовления детонаторов. О бесчинствах бомбистов в уйгурятнике знает весь мир. 30 апреля на железнодорожной станции в Урумчи прогремел взрыв, унесший три жизни и поколечивший 79 человек. 22 мая на центральном рынке административного центра СУАР произошел еще один крупный теракт: в результате взрыва самодельных бомб 39 человек погибли, 90 получили ранения.
- Китай: автобусы стали новой мишенью экстремистов? В Гуанчжоу 15 июля в вечерний час-пик взорвался автобус, следовавший по одному из наиболее оживленных маршрутов. В результате 20 пассажиров получили серьезные ожоги, двое погибли на месте. Список жертв может возрасти: еще двое человек находятся в критическом состоянии. В полиции не исключают, а сарафанное радио - так просто уверенно в том, что причина взрыва - не технические неполадки, а очередной акт экстремизма. В нынешнем месяце в Народной Республике автобусы уже поджигали. Пятого июля подобный инцидент произошел в городе Ханчжоу. Тогда пострадали 32 человека, но, к счастью, никто не погиб. Поджог совершил некий 34-летний гражданин по не названным пока мотивам.
- Китай назвал первые госкорпорации, подлежащие частичной приватизации. "В экспериментальном порядке" в руки частного капитала отойдет часть фондов Китайской национальной корпорации стройматериалов и Китайской национальной фармацефтической корпорации. Процесс предполагает также ввод в совет директоров этих холдингов представителей частного бизнеса. Если эксперимент пройдет нормально, приватизация поднебесных госпредприятий будет набирать обороты. Напомним: чуть ранее премьер Госсовета КНР Ли Кэцян сообщил, что Китай готовит довольно объемный список госкомпаний, подлежащих частичной приватизации. Это очередной шаг по либерализации национальной экономики. "Мы открываем двери для негосударственного капитала, предоставим частным фирмам больше инвестиционных возможностей, более широкое поле для игры", - отметил глава китайского правительства. Он напомнил, что в этих целях власти также урезают список инвестпроектов, требующих одобрения Госсовета КНР. В минувшем году он сократился на 416 пунктов, в нынешнем - будет урезан еще на 200. Напомним, на минувшей неделе Госсовет КНР сообщил: процесс либерализации национального рынка будет завершен к 2020 году. К тому времени планируется открыть для частного капитала абсолютное большинство секторов экономики кроме тех, которые войдут в составляемый властями "negative list".
- "Дисквалифицирован за обоссывание стены": организаторы пекинского марафона вводят новые правила для бегунов.
Участников ежегодного 42-километрового забега будут снимать с дистанции за уринацию на забор или стену, особенно если стена эта относится к памятнику архитектуры. Решение принято после скандала, произошедшего во время пекинского марафона в минувшем году: один из журналистов запечатлел на фотопленку, как спортсмены обоссали всю стену одного из древних пекинских храмов. Общественность негодовала. Сами участники забега в ответ попросили расставить вдоль маршрута мобильные туалеты. Другие обозначили, что в большинстве стран мира писать где попало марафонцам не запрещают, ибо многие бегут на время и не могут позволить себе делать лишний крюк в поисках туалета. Пекинский марафон-2014 состоится 19 октября.
- Самый большой в мире дьюти-фри откроется на острове Хайнань. Он будет расположен в городе Санья в торговом центре Haitang Bay, который откроет двери 1 сентября. Мега-дьюти-фри будет занимать больше половины общей площади нового комплекса: 45 тыс из 70 тыс кв.м.
- Издание China Daily начало публикацию серии материалов, посвященных грядущему празднованию 70-летия Победы над фашизмом. Первая статья рассказывает о военной академии Вампу
When he was 14 years old, Chen Hanfeng discovered that everything he had been told about his father was untrue. "It was hot summer day in 1958. My mother came to my school, hugged me, and said, 'Your father is dead. He's been dead for two years'.
Up until that point I had believed that he was fighting in the Korean War. For the past eight years, that had served as the explanation for his absence," said the 60-year-old, whose deep-set eyes never fail to arouse memories among those who knew his late father.
"It was plainly an excuse - the Korean War ended in 1953. But what could a child do? I had no choice but to believe that my father was still alive and well somewhere, until I was told to stop believing that," he said.
It would take another eight years for Chen to discover the full truth about his father. "My father was born in Hanoi, Vietnam, in 1908. But before his death from lung cancer in 1956, he had been made a major general by both the Socialist Republic of Vietnam and the People's Republic of China," said Chen, referring to the man known as Nguyen Son in Vietnam and Hong Shui in China. "If my father is a legend, then his legend really started at Whampoa, China's first modern military academy. He entered the academy in 1926, two years after it was founded in Guangzhou by the renowned revolutionary Sun Yat-sen."
According to Chen Yuhuan, a historian and Whampoa expert, between the mid-1920s and the mid-1940s, the academy was a beacon for young people, not only in China but also across the whole East and Southeast Asian region. "Back then, the situation in China reminded those patriotic youths of the suffering and depredations of their own motherlands. What they saw at Whampoa - founded by Sun to unify China by force - was a future they aspired to for their own war-torn countries."
The Soviet experience
But the instructors were just as important as the students, especially the instructors from what was then the Soviet Union. "The Chinese Nationalists, then led by Sun, and the Soviets were brought together by their own visions and ambitions. The Chinese desperately needed money, weaponry and expertise for the new military academy, while the Soviets were enthusiastic about spreading the ideas and influence of the Comintern," Chen Yuhuan said. "They also greatly facilitated the cooperation between the Kuomintang (the Chinese Nationalist Party) and the Chinese Communist Party, giving Whampoa a prominent place in the history of both parties."
About 100 Russians are thought to have taught at Whampoa between 1924 and 1926, and Chen Yuhuan credits them with laying the groundwork for the academy. "They introduced ideology into the training of the officer corps," he said. "Given China's long feudal history and its more recent efforts to suppress the violent warlords that fought each other for control of the north of the country, it was of the utmost importance to instill a sense of loyalty in the soldiers' minds. Not loyalty toward a specific person, but toward a strong and democratic republic."
However, despite their emphasis on ideology, the Soviet instructors were anything but idealistic. "The majority of those sent to China had fought in the Russian Civil War, and they made sure that their hard-learned lessons were not wasted," Chen Yuhuan said. "They helped to turn out a crop of students every six month, using a curriculum that was tightly built around these men's future performances on the field of battle."
They even took the classroom to the frontline, according to amateur historian Cun Meng, whose great-grandfather taught at Whampoa in the early days, and whose grandfather attended the academy in the early 1940s. "No armchair generals, those Russians were brave soldiers and brilliant strategists who had participated in almost every military campaign launched by the Nationalists against the warlords between 1924 and 1926," the 38-year-old said.
Although the Soviet instructors were disciplinarians, that doesn't mean they didn't have their own "hobbies", to use Cun's word. "They would get up really early for morning drill, far earlier than the students. But outside the classroom, they were heavy drinkers with a soft spot for alcohol. My guess is that both had a lot to do with the forbidding climate of their native land, which, in retrospect, only made their stay in subtropical Guangzhou even more remarkable," said Cun, who still has an iron trunk his great-grandfather was given by a Soviet colleague.
Some of the instructors became minor celebrities on both sides of the academy's walls. One of them was Vasily Blyukher, an outstanding figure for the Bolsheviks during the Russian Civil War. Blyukher arrived in China in 1924 under the code name "Galen", after his wife, Galina, and was a trusted adviser to Chiang Kai-shek, who became the Nationalist leader following Sun's death in March 1925. He was so well- known and popular at the time that Guangzhou people referred to his blond-haired, blue-eyed countrymen as "General Galen".
However, the "Galens" were forced to leave China in late 1926 when Chiang, who was also Whampoa's first commandant, began a purge of Chinese Communists, and by extension the Soviets, at the academy. However, the mass exodus didn't signal the end of foreign instructors at Whampoa.
A common cause
"Hard on the heels of the Russians came the Japanese and the Germans. This was not entirely surprising because many Kuomintang leaders, including Chiang, had studied at a military academy in Japan," said Chen Yu, who has written extensively about Whampoa's history.
However, the Japanese presence caused unease from the start, mainly because of the growing tensions between the two countries, which culminated in Japan's invasion of China in September 1931. "The leaders at Whampoa then looked to Europe for the world's most advanced military theories and weaponry. They bought heavily from Germany, the technological giant of Europe, and along with the German tanks and machine guns came the German instructors," he said.
But it didn't last. By the late 1930s, Germany had become increasingly preoccupied with its own ambitions, which would soon drag the world into war. As the German instructors headed home, China headed toward its inevitable conflict with the Japanese. The Communists and Nationalists joined forces, and former classmates from Whampoa, who had previously fought on different sides, discovered a common goal: to expel the invaders.
The Soviets returned briefly, but never in the same numbers as before, according to Chen Yu. "From 1937 to 1941, the Chinese basically fought the Japanese without outside assistance. It was a really hard time. Then came the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec 7, 1941, which brought the US into the war and turned the tables," he said. "The Americans began to assist China in its battle against Japan. The Flying Tigers (a mixed squadron of pilots from China and the US) may be the best-known unit, but military instructors were actually appearing at many Whampoa campuses - the academy had set up more than 20 branches in the unoccupied areas."
In the past decade, Wang Yi, a high school teacher turned Whampoa history enthusiast, has spoken with hundreds of World War II veterans. "The American instructors surfaced in the conversations, albeit briefly. A man who'd studied at the Whampoa branch in Xi'an recalled his first class with an American instructor. Instead of diving directly into a discussion about the war, the teacher spoke about George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, and the support the American public showed for the Chinese cause," the 55-year-old said.
"It's worth noting that most of the students at Whampoa's Xi'an branch had come from northeastern China, which was overrun by the Japanese in 1932. Bereaved and homeless, they needed a big injection of hope and confidence to carry on during the most critical moment of the prolonged conflict. It seems to me that the American instructor understood that."
Although interpreters were needed to get the message through, some of the students were gifted linguists, especially those from neighboring Asian countries, many of whom, including Hong Shui, had traveled widely before entering Whampoa.
According to Chen Hanfeng, his late father was following the footsteps of Ho Chi Minh, the founder of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. Fluent in Russian, English, French and Chinese, Ho Chi Minh came to China in 1924 to act as an interpreter for the Russian instructors, but also occasionally delivered lectures on socialism to his fellow Vietnamese at Whampoa.
"He later opened a class to train Vietnamese officers at Whampoa's Nanning branch, not far from the Sino-Vietnamese border," Chen Hanfeng said.
"Then there were the Koreans, who had set up a provisional government on Chinese soil before starting to cultivate their own revolutionary forces, with 'Koreans-only' classes at several branches of the academy. The atrocities those countries endured at the hands of fascist Japan formed a tight bond between the young students," he added.
An 'excruciating' decision
Fluent in Chinese, with an unmistakable northern accent, Hong Shui's foreign background was never suspected, not even by his future wife. "When my mother first saw him in about 1937, my father was making an anti-Japanese speech, in Chinese, to a group of avid listeners. My mother later told me that she was deeply impressed, and that the last thing in her mind was that my father might be a foreigner," Chen Hanfeng said.
In January 1938, Hong Shui, who had joined the Chinese Communist Party in 1927, married Chen Jiange, who was also a committed communist. Chen Hanfeng was born in 1944.
A year later in November, 1945, while Chen's mother was pregnant with her second son, Hong Shui received an invitation from Ho Chi Minh, who had become the president of Vietnam. The Japanese had been defeated, but the French, who first colonized Vietnam in the late 19th century, had returned.
"My father answered the call and was made a general in the Vietnamese army. During his stay in Vietnam, news reached him that my mother, my younger brother and I had all died in the Chinese Civil War (1946-49) between the Communists and the Nationalists," he said.
The return
Although inconsolable, at Ho Chi Minh's request Hong Shui married a Vietnamese woman and returned to China in 1950, only to discover that his family was still alive.
"It was excruciating for them both, but my mother made the decision to end the marriage. Looking back, it was so obvious that she spent her whole life loving and protecting my father. She made sure he had a peaceful life during his final five years in China with his Vietnamese wife and children," said Chen Hanfeng. "And she made an effort to get my brother and me to believe that our father was always with us, wherever he might be.
"When she came to my school and told me the truth, it was, as she later told me, because my teacher had called to say I had been naughty," he said. "But I only got to know the whole story in the mid-1960s, during the Vietnam War, when we were invited to meet visiting Vietnamese officials.
In 1956, a year after he'd been made a major general by the Chinese government, Hong Shui was diagnosed with lung cancer. He insisted on returning to Vietnam, and passed away in October of that year. Chen Jiange died in 2012 at the age of 99.
Reflecting on the significance of his father's time at Whampoa, Chen Hanfeng said: "My father's Chinese name means 'flood'. He once likened himself to a torrent of water, charging irresistibly through life's rugged landscape, against all the odds. In the same way, Whampoa really was the place where all these different 'rivers' met and formed a strong torrent that changed the world once and for all."
- Марка ароматная: почта КНР последовала примеру производителей наших любимых китайских стелек из 90-х. В Поднебесной выпущена серия фруктовых марок, каждая из которых источает аромат изображенного на ней плода. Марка с яблочком пахнет яблочком, марка с грушкой, соответственно - грушкой. Технология изготовления этих почтовых знаков довольно проста: в краску подмешали ароматизаторы. Вероятно, в самом большом восторге от новинки - авторы любовных посланий: письма боле не надо надушивать парфюмами - они и так будут пахнуть приятственно с такими-то марками...
- Сказ про то, что теща - зло. A 49-year-old man surnamed Zhou, who drove to a bus station in Changsha on June 23 to pick up his girlfriend, thought he was stepping on the brake but actually stomped on the accelerator when he saw the woman's mother with her. The sight of the mother made him so nervous that he stepped on the wrong pedal, he told the police. His mistake caused one death and 11 injuries.
Повод для всенародного ликования на сегодня
16 июля 1966 года состоялось последнее купание председателя Мао в реке Янцзы. Великому кормчему было уже 73 года.