Disarmament is easy to say, but difficult to implement, because at that time, China's army had a total of 4 million posts, and a reduction of 6.5438+0 million was equivalent to a reduction of a quarter. There are too many interests involved behind this. To this end, the point will let He, then deputy director of the General Staff Operations Department, take charge of this work.
So, who is this He Zheng Wen? Can he really finish this arduous task?
He 19 17 was born in a poor family in Banqiaokou Township, Tongjiang County, Sichuan Province. When he was less than 8 years old, he did odd jobs in the local area and studied in a private school for two and a half years.
1932, the Fourth Army of the Chinese Workers and Peasants Red Army passed through Tongjiang, Sichuan. He Zheng Wen, 15 or 16 years old, is still a child in the mountains who is not sensible. One day, a tall Red Army man asked him how old Zheng Wen was. He Zheng Wen replied that he was 65,438+05 years old. The Red Army laughed: I am older than you 12 years old, so I should be your big brother. He told He many revolutionary truths, which made He too excited to sleep at night. The next day, he joined the Red Army in Zheng Wen. Later, he learned that this eldest brother was the later founding general Wang Shusheng.
Later, he joined the Zheng Wen Red Army in the Long March. After coming to northern Shaanxi, because of his excellent work, he quickly caught the attention of Liu Bocheng, and Liu Bocheng gave him a lot of advice. War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression period, why did he ever change his name to Huayi? When Liu Bocheng knew that he would talk to him in the future and asked him why he changed his name, Zheng Wen replied: He changed his name because he was a soldier. Liu Bocheng severely criticized him: workers and peasants cadres must attach importance to cultural learning, and they can't do well without a cultural revolution. From then on, He Zheng Wen began to really pay attention to the study of cultural knowledge. With his own efforts, he soon became one of the four outstanding staff officers in Taihang Mountain area.
Later, he and Zheng Wen participated in War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression and the War of Liberation, and made many achievements. 1955 was already the deputy commander of Chengdu Military Region, and was awarded the rank of founding major general in the same year.
Before disarmament, Deng Xiaoping specifically told He: "The previous streamlining and reorganization only reduced the number of people, and the system did not change much. It's like pulling out the chicken feathers and not killing the chicken. As a result, there is a lot of applause, but the essence of streamlining and restructuring can't be implemented ... "
He Zheng Wen himself knows from many years' practice in army building that the development of the army has entered a misunderstanding in quantity: in all previous streamlining and reorganization, only a few units and organs were streamlined and expanded once, while reducing while increasing, and they were fragmented and overstaffed. The troops will be laid off this year and expanded next year. When cadres change jobs, they will be given another batch, again and again. The same is true for directly affiliated security units and colleges. Here, the orders are withdrawal and merger, but there are reconstruction, division and expansion. In this way, there has been no substantive progress in disarmament.
At that time, He's four children were all in the army, and they all developed well. He Zheng Wen thinks that since he is in charge of disarmament, he should set an example and "lay off" his children first. He offered to work for his children and made them all change jobs.
But more difficult things are yet to come. As an old Red Army who has experienced the Long March, he has forged deep friendship with many military leaders during his decades of military career. Now he has to turn his head to cut them. Cut not only other people's meat, but also his own heart! In those days, he was so worried about who to cut, who to keep, who to withdraw, and who to protect that he couldn't sleep all night, lost a lot of weight, and his white hair grew crazy.
But no matter how complicated the situation is, he always sticks to his own 16 words: be fair to the public, have the overall situation in mind, adhere to principles and be unselfish.
On one occasion, He Zheng Wen had a meeting late into the night. As soon as he got home, he received a phone call from the old chief. The old chief asked if one of his old men was laid off this time. He Zheng Wen knew that this army was on the list of being laid off, but he couldn't say that he could only tell the old chief to learn about it later, so he stayed up all night. The next morning, the old chief called again and talked about the glorious history of this army, counting the number of * * * of the party and the country and the generals of the army. Of course he knows what the old chief means, but he still insists on disarmament.
What bothered him most at that time was the plan of "Chengdu Military Region merged into Kunming Military Region", which was later the "Cheng Kun Change".
At that time, according to the plan of the Military Commission, only one of Chengdu Military Region and Kunming Military Region could be retained. At that time, the counterattack against Vietnam was not completely over, and the Kunming Military Region was the only military region with combat missions among all military regions. This is a good reason to keep the Kunming Military Region.
* * * of the Kunming Military Region is also very confident, and the leaders of the Military Commission are also very calm. The preliminary plan is to merge the Chengdu Military Region into the Kunming Military Region. However, after constant meetings and debates, it is believed that the idea of retaining the Chengdu Military Region has gradually gained the upper hand, because the Chengdu Military Region has been shouldering the important task of being the strategic rear of Tibet for decades because it is the closest and most convenient to Tibet. Moreover, Chengdu is the economic and cultural center of southwest China, with developed transportation, large population and rich products. If the headquarters of the military region is located in Kunming, the strategic depth is relatively short, which is not conducive to the mobility and mobilization of troops in the event of a situation.
The understanding is unified, but before putting forward this revision proposal to the Military Commission, he hesitated, because he was from Sichuan and had worked in the Chengdu Military Region for more than 20 years. Will it be misunderstood to say that he is biased towards the old unit now? However, after careful consideration, he decided to stick to his opinion. Yes, the ancients still had the power to "hide from relatives". As long as disarmament can proceed smoothly, even if he suffers some criticism in the future, what is it?
Considering He and others, disarmament can proceed smoothly. 1April 4, 987, Xin Xu, deputy chief of staff of the Chinese People's Liberation Army, proudly announced to the world: "The task of streamlining and reorganizing the China People's Liberation Army has been basically completed! After reducing the number of posts by 6.5438+0 million, the total number of military places will be 3 million. "
On September 29th, 2000, General He died in Beijing at the age of 83.