Zhou Enlai

Zhou Enlai (Chinese: 周恩来 ; pinyin: Zhōu Ēnlái;

Zhou Enlai
周恩来
1 1 2
Wade–Giles: Chou Ên -lai ; 5 March 1898 – 8 January
1976) was the first Premier of the People's Republic of
China serving from 1 October 1949 until his death on 8
January 1976. Zhou served under Chairman Mao Zedong
and helped the Communist Party rise to power, later
helping consolidate its control, form its foreign policy, and
develop the Chinese economy.

As a diplomat, Zhou served as the Chinese foreign

minister from 1949 to 1958. Advocating peaceful
coexistence with the West after the Korean War, he
participated in the 1954 Geneva Conference and the 1955
Bandung Conference, and helped orchestrate Richard
Nixon's 1972 visit to China. He helped devise policies
regarding disputes with the United States, Taiwan, the
Soviet Union (after 1960), India, Korea, and Vietnam.

Zhou survived the purges of other top officials during the

Cultural Revolution. While Mao dedicated most of his Zhou in 1972
later years to political struggle and ideological work, Zhou 1st Premier of the People's Republic of
was one of the main driving forces behind the affairs of China
state during much of the Cultural Revolution. His attempts In office

at mitigating the Red Guards' damage and his efforts to

1 October 1949 – 8 January 1976
protect others from their wrath made him immensely
popular in the Cultural Revolution's later stages. Leader Mao Zedong
1st vice-premier Dong Biwu
Mao's health began to decline in 1971 and 1972, and Lin Chen Yun
Biao fell into disgrace and later died in a plane crash.
Lin Biao
Amid these events, Zhou was elected to the vacant
Deng Xiaoping
position of First Vice Chairman of the Communist Party
by the 10th Central Committee in 1973 and thereby Preceded by Yan Xishan (as Premier
designated as Mao's successor (the third person to be so of the Republic of China)
designated after Liu Shaoqi and Lin Biao), but still Succeeded by Hua Guofeng
struggled internally against the Gang of Four over
Minister of Foreign Affairs
leadership of China. His last major public appearance was
at the first meeting of the 4th National People's Congress In office

on 13 January 1975, where he presented the government 1 October 1949 – 11 February 1958
work report. He then fell out of the public eye for medical Premier Himself
treatment and died one year later. The massive public
Preceded by Hu Shih
outpouring of grief which his death provoked in Beijing
turned to anger at the Gang of Four, leading to the 1976 (as Minister of Foreign
Tiananmen Incident. Although Zhou was succeeded by Affairs of the Republic of
Hua Guofeng as First Vice Chairman and designated China)
Succeeded by Chen Yi
successor, Zhou's ally Deng Xiaoping was able to First Vice Chairman of the Chinese
outmaneuver the Gang of Four politically and took Hua's Communist Party
place as paramount leader by 1978. In office

30 August 1973 – 8 January 1976

Chairman Mao Zedong
Contents Preceded by Lin Biao (1971)

Early life Succeeded by Hua Guofeng

Youth Vice Chairman of the Chinese Communist
Education Party

Early political activities In office

European activities 28 September 1956 – 1 August 1966

Chairman Mao Zedong
Political and military work in Whampoa
Establishment in Guangzhou 2nd Chairman of the National Committee
Of the CPPCC
Military activities
In office

Political activities
December 1954 – 8 January 1976
Nationalist-Communist split Honorary Mao Zedong
Extent of cooperation Chairman
Activities in Shanghai
Preceded by Mao Zedong
Flight from Shanghai
Succeeded by Vacant (1976–1978)
Activities during the Chinese Civil War
Deng Xiaoping
The Sixth Party Congress
Underground work: establishment Personal details

KMT response to Zhou's intelligence work Born 5 March 1898

The Jiangxi Soviet Huai'an, Jiangsu, Qing
Chiang's Encirclement Campaigns Empire
The Long March Died 8 January 1976
The Xi'an Incident (aged 77)
Beijing, People's
Activities during World War II
Propaganda and intelligence in Wuhan Republic of China

Military strategy in Wuhan Cause of death Bladder cancer

Adoption of orphans Nationality Chinese
Flight to Chongqing Political party Chinese Communist
Early activities in Chongqing Party (1921–1976)
Intelligence work in Chongqing Kuomintang (1923–1927)
Economic and diplomatic activities Spouse(s) Deng Yingchao (m. 1925)
Relationship with Mao Zedong
Children Sun Weishi, Wang Shu
Diplomatic efforts with the United States (both adopted)[1][2]
The Dixie mission
Education Nankai Middle School,
1944–1945
Meiji University
The Chongqing negotiations
Alma mater Nankai University
The Marshall negotiations
Occupation Politician · strategist ·
Resumption of Civil War
revolutionary · diplomat
Military strategist and intelligence chief
Diplomacy Signature
PRC diplomat and statesman
Diplomatic situation of the PRC in 1949
Diplomacy with India
The Korean War
Diplomacy with China's communist neighbors Website zhouenlai.people.cn (htt
The Geneva Conference p://ZhouEnlai.people.cn)

The Asian–African Conference Military service

Position on Taiwan Branch/service Chinese Red Army
The Shanghai communique People's Liberation Army
The Great Leap Forward Battles/wars Eastern Expeditions
The Cultural Revolution Nanchang Uprising
Initial efforts of Mao and Lin
Encirclement Campaigns
Political survival
Second Sino-Japanese
Death
War
Illness and death
Chinese Civil War
Mao's response
Memorial
Suppression of public mourning Zhou Enlai
The Tiananmen Incident Simplified Chinese 周恩来
Legacy Traditional Chinese 周恩來
Works Transcriptions
See also Standard Mandarin
Notes Hanyu Pinyin Zhōu Ēnlái
References Gwoyeu Romatzyh Jou Enlai
Citations Wade–Giles Chou1 Ên1-lai2
Sources IPA [ʈʂóʊ ə́nlǎɪ]
External links Wu
Suzhounese Tseu En-le

Early life Yue: Cantonese

Yale Romanization Jāu Yān-lòih
Jyutping Zau1 Jan1-loi4
Youth IPA [tsɐ́u jɐ́n lɔ̏ːy]

Zhou Enlai was born in Huai'an, Jiangsu province on 5 March Courtesy name
1898, the first son of his branch of the Zhou family. The Zhou
family was originally from Shaoxing in Zhejiang province. During
Chinese 翔宇
Transcriptions
the late Qing dynasty, Shaoxing was famous as the home of
families such as Zhou's, whose members worked as government Standard Mandarin
"clerks" (師爷 , shiye) generation after generation.[3] To move up Hanyu Pinyin Xiángyǔ
the ladder in civil service, the men in these families often had to be Wade–Giles Hsiang2-yü3
transferred, and in the late years of the Qing dynasty, Zhou Enlai's
branch of the family moved to Huai'an. Even after the move, Yue: Cantonese
however, the family continued to view Shaoxing as its ancestral Jyutping Coeng4-jyu5
home.[4]
 Zhou's grandfather, Zhou Panlong, and his granduncle, Zhou
Jun'ang, were the first members of the family to move to Huai'an.
Panlong apparently passed the provincial examinations, and Zhou
Enlai later claimed that Panlong served as magistrate governing
Huai'an county.[5] Zhou's father, Zhou Yineng, was the second of
Zhou Panlong's four sons. Zhou's birth mother, surnamed Wan,
was the daughter of a prominent Jiangsu official.[note 1]

Like many others, the economic fortunes of Zhou's large family of

scholar-officials were decimated by a great economic recession that
China suffered in the late 19th century. Zhou Yineng had a
reputation for honesty, gentleness, intelligence and concern for
others, but was also considered "weak" and "lacking in discipline
and determination". He was unsuccessful in his personal life, and
drifted across China doing various occupations, working in Beijing,
Shandong, Anhui, Shenyang, Inner Mongolia and Sichuan. Zhou
Zhou Enlai (1912) Enlai later remembered his father as being always away from home
and generally unable to support his family.[7]

Soon after birth, Zhou Enlai was adopted by his father's youngest brother, Zhou Yigan, who was ill with
tuberculosis. Apparently the adoption was arranged because the family feared Yigan would die without an
heir.[note 2] Zhou Yigan died soon after the adoption, and Zhou Enlai was raised by Yigan's widow, whose
surname was Chen. Madame Chen was also from a scholarly family and received a traditional literary
education. According to Zhou's own account, he was very close to his adoptive mother and acquired his
lasting interest in Chinese literature and opera from her. Madame Chen taught Zhou to read and write at an
early age, and Zhou later claimed to have read the famous vernacular novel Journey to the West at the age
of six.[8] By the age of eight, he was reading other traditional Chinese novels, including the Water Margin,
Romance of the Three Kingdoms, and Dream of the Red Chamber.[6]

Zhou's birth mother Wan died in 1907 when Zhou was 9, and his adoptive mother Chen in 1908 when
Zhou was 10. Zhou's father was working in Hubei, far from Jiangsu, so Zhou and his two younger brothers
returned to Huai'an and lived with his father's remaining younger brother Yikui for the next two years.[9] In
1910, Zhou's uncle Yigeng, his father's older brother, offered to care for Zhou. The family in Huai'an
agreed, and Zhou was sent to stay with his uncle in Manchuria at Shenyang, where Zhou Yigeng worked
in a government office.[note 3]

Education

In Shenyang, Zhou attended the Dongguan Model Academy, a modern-style school. His previous
education consisted entirely of homeschooling. In addition to new subjects such as English and science,
Zhou was also exposed to the writings of reformers and radicals such as Liang Qichao, Kang Youwei,
Chen Tianhua, Zou Rong and Zhang Binglin.[10][11] At the age of fourteen, Zhou declared that his
motivation for pursuing education was to "become a great man who will take up the heavy responsibilities
of the country in the future."[12] In 1913, Zhou's uncle was transferred to Tianjin, where Zhou entered the
famous Nankai Middle School.

Nankai Middle School was founded by Yan Xiu, a prominent scholar and philanthropist, and headed by
Zhang Boling, one of the most important Chinese educators of the 20th century.[13] Nankai's teaching
methods were unusual by contemporary Chinese standards. By the time Zhou began attending, it had
adopted the educational model used at the Phillips Academy in the United States.[14] The school's
reputation, with its "highly disciplined" daily routine and "strict moral code",[15] attracted many students
who later became prominent in public life. Zhou's friends and
classmates there ranged from Ma Jun (an early communist leader
executed in 1927) to K. C. Wu (later mayor of Shanghai and
governor of Taiwan under the Nationalist party).[16] Zhou's talents
also attracted the attention of Yan Xiu and Zhang Boling. Yan in
particular thought highly of Zhou, helping to pay for his studies in
Japan and later France.[17]

Yan was so impressed with Zhou that he encouraged Zhou to

marry his daughter, but Zhou declined. Zhou later expressed the
reasons for his decision not to marry Yan's daughter to his
classmate, Zhang Honghao. Zhou said that he declined the
marriage because he feared that his financial prospects would not
be promising, and that Yan would, as his father-in-law, later
dominate his life.[18]

Zhou did well in his studies at Nankai; he excelled in Chinese, won

several awards in the school speech club, and became editor of the Zhou Enlai as a student in Nankai
school newspaper in his final year. Zhou was also very active in Middle School
acting and producing dramas and plays at Nankai; many students
who were not otherwise acquainted with him knew of him through
his acting.[19] Nankai preserves a number of essays and articles written by Zhou at this time, and these
reflect the discipline, training, and concern for country that Nankai's founders attempted to instill in their
students. At the school's tenth commencement in June 1917, Zhou was one of five graduating students
honored at the ceremony, and one of the two valedictorians.[20]

By the time that he graduated from Nankai, Zhang Boling's teachings of gong (public spirit) and neng
(ability) had made a great impression on him. His participation in debates and stage performances
contributed to his eloquence and skills of persuasion. Zhou left Nankai with a great desire to pursue public
service, and to acquire the skills required to do so.[21]

Following many of his classmates, Zhou went to Japan in July 1917 for further studies. During his two
years in Japan, Zhou spent most of his time in the East Asian Higher Preparatory School, a language school
for Chinese students. Zhou's studies were supported by his uncles, and apparently Nankai founder Yan Xiu
as well, but their funds were limited and during this period Japan suffered from severe inflation.[22] Zhou
originally planned on winning one of the scholarships offered by the Chinese government; these
scholarships, however, required Chinese students to pass entrance examinations in Japanese universities.
Zhou took entrance examinations for at least two schools, but failed to gain admission.[23] Zhou's reported
anxieties were compounded by the death of his uncle, Zhou Yikui, his inability to master Japanese, and the
acute Japanese cultural chauvinism that discriminated against Chinese. By the time that Zhou returned to
China in the spring of 1919, he had become deeply disenchanted with Japanese culture, rejecting the idea
that the Japanese political model was relevant to China and disdaining the values of elitism and militarism
that he observed.[24]

Zhou's diaries and letters from his time in Tokyo show a deep interest in politics and current events, in
particular, the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the Bolsheviks' new policies. He began to read avidly Chen
Duxiu's progressive and left-leaning magazine, New Youth.[25] He probably read some early Japanese
works on Marx, and it has been claimed that he even attended Kawakami Hajime's lectures at Kyoto
University. Kawakami was an important figure in the early history of Japanese Marxism, and his
translations and articles influenced a generation of Chinese communists.[26] However, it now seems
unlikely that Zhou met him or heard any of his lectures.[27] Zhou's diaries also show his interest in Chinese
student protests in opposition to the Sino-Japanese Joint Defence Agreement in May 1918, but he did not
actively participate in them or return to China as part of the "Returning Home Movement".[28] His active
role in political movements began after his return to China.

Early political activities

Zhou returned to Tianjin sometime in the spring of 1919. Historians

disagree over his participation in the May Fourth Movement (May
to June 1919). Zhou's "official" Chinese biography states that he
was a leader of the Tianjin student protests in the May Fourth
movement,[29] but many modern scholars believe that it is highly
unlikely that Zhou participated at all, based on the total lack of
direct evidence among the surviving records from the
period.[29][30] In July 1919, however, Zhou became editor of the
Tianjin Student Union Bulletin, apparently at the request of his
Nankai classmate, Ma Jun, a founder of the Union.[31] During its
brief existence from July 1919 to early 1920, the Bulletin was
widely read by student groups around the country and suppressed
on at least one occasion by the national government as "harmful to
public safety and social order."[32]

When Nankai became a university in August 1919, Zhou was in

the first class, but was an activist full-time. His political activities
A young Zhou Enlai (1919) continued to expand, and in September, he and several other
students agreed to establish the "Awakening Society", a small
group, never numbering more than 25.[33] In explaining the goals
and purpose of the Awakening Society, Zhou declared that "anything that is incompatible with progress in
current times, such as militarism, the bourgeoisie, partylords, bureaucrats, inequality between men and
women, obstinate ideas, obsolete morals, old ethics... should be abolished or reformed", and affirmed that it
was the purpose of the Society to spread this awareness among the Chinese people. It was in this society
that Zhou first met his future wife, Deng Yingchao.[34] In some ways, the Awakening Society resembled
the clandestine Marxist study group at Peking University headed by Li Dazhao, with the group members
using numbers instead of names for "secrecy". (Zhou was "Number Five", a pseudonym which he
continued to use in later years.)[35] Indeed, immediately after the group was established, it invited Li
Dazhao to give a lecture on Marxism.

Zhou assumed a more prominent active role in political activities over the next few months.[36] The largest
of these activities were rallies in support of a nationwide boycott of Japanese goods. As the boycott became
more effective, the national government, under pressure from Japan, attempted to suppress it. On 23
January 1920, a confrontation over boycott activities in Tianjin led to the arrest of a number of people,
including several Awakening Society members, and on 29 January Zhou led a march on the Governor's
Office in Tianjin to present a petition calling for the arrestees' release. Zhou and three other leaders were
themselves arrested. The arrestees were held for over six months; during their detention, Zhou supposedly
organized discussions on Marxism.[37] At their trial in July, Zhou and six others were sentenced to two
months; the rest were found not guilty. All were immediately released since they had already been held
over six months.

After Zhou's release, he and the Awakening Society met with several Beijing organizations and agreed to
form a "Reform Federation"; during these activities Zhou became more familiar with Li Dazhao and met
Zhang Shenfu, who was the contact between Li in Beijing and Chen Duxiu in Shanghai. Both men were
organizing underground Communist cells in cooperation with Grigori Voitinsky,[38] a Comintern agent, but
Zhou apparently did not meet Voitinsky at this point.

Soon after his release, Zhou decided to go to Europe to study. (He was expelled from Nankai University
during his detention.) Although money was a problem, he received a scholarship from Yan Xiu.[39] In
order to gain greater funding, he successfully approached a Tianjin newspaper, Yishi bao (literally, Current
Events Newspaper), for work as a "special correspondent" in Europe. Zhou left Shanghai for Europe on 7
November 1920 with a group of 196 work study students, including friends from Nankai and Tianjin.[40]

Zhou's experiences after the May Fourth incident seem to have been crucial to his Communist career.
Zhou's friends in the Awakening Society were similarly affected. 15 of the group's members became
Communists for at least some time, and the group remained close later on. Zhou and six other group
members travelled to Europe in the next two years, and Zhou eventually married Deng Yingchao, the
group's youngest member.

European activities

Zhou's group arrived in Marseille on 13 December 1920. Unlike

most other Chinese students, who went to Europe on work-study
programs, Zhou's scholarship and position with Yishi bao meant
that he was well provided for and did not have to do any work
during his stay. Because of his financial position, he was able to
devote himself full-time to revolutionary activities.[40] In a letter to
his cousin on 30 January 1921, Zhou said that his goals in Europe
were to survey the social conditions in foreign countries and their
methods of resolving social issues, in order to apply such lessons in
China after his return. In the same letter, Zhou told his cousin that,
regarding his adoption of a specific ideology, "I still have to make
up my mind."[41]

While in Europe, Zhou, also named as John Knight, studied the

differing approaches to resolving class conflict adopted by various Zhou during his time in France
European nations. In London in January 1921, Zhou witnessed a (1920s)
large miners' strike and wrote a series of articles for the Yishi bao
(generally sympathetic to the miners) examining the conflict
between workers and employers, and the conflict's resolution. After five weeks in London he moved to
Paris, where interest in Russia's 1917 October Revolution was high. In a letter to his cousin, Zhou
identified two broad paths of reform for China: "gradual reform" (as in England) or "violent means" (as in
Russia). Zhou wrote that "I do not have a preference for either the Russian or the British way... I would
prefer something in-between, rather than one of these two extremes".[41]

Still interested in academic programs, Zhou traveled to Britain in January 1921 to visit Edinburgh
University. Concerned by financial problems and language requirements, he did not enroll, returning to
France at the end of January. There are no records of Zhou entering any academic program in France. In
spring 1921, he joined a Chinese Communist cell.[note 4] Zhou was recruited by Zhang Shenfu, whom he
had met in August of the previous year in connection with Li Dazhao. He also knew Zhang through
Zhang's wife, Liu Qingyang, a member of the Awakening Society. Zhou has sometimes been portrayed at
this time as uncertain in his politics,[42] but his swift move to Communism suggests otherwise.[note 5]
The cell Zhou belonged to was based in Paris;[43] in addition to Zhou, Zhang, and Liu it included two
other students, Zhao Shiyan and Chen Gongpei. Over the next several months, this group eventually
formed a united organization with a group of Chinese radicals from Hunan, who were living in Montargis
south of Paris. This group included such later prominent figures as Cai Hesen, Li Lisan, Chen Yi, Nie
Rongzhen, Deng Xiaoping and also Guo Longzhen, another member of the Awakening Society. Unlike
Zhou, most of the students in this group were participants in the work-study program. A series of conflicts
with the Chinese administrators of the program over low pay and poor working conditions resulted in over
a hundred students occupying the program's offices at the Sino-French Institute in Lyon in September 1921.
The students, including several people from the Montargis group, were arrested and deported. Zhou was
apparently not one of the occupying students and remained in France until February or March 1922, when
he moved with Zhang and Liu from Paris to Berlin. Zhou's move to Berlin was perhaps because the
relatively "lenient" political atmosphere in Berlin made it more favorable as a base for overall European
organizing.[44] In addition, the Western European Secretariat of the Comintern was located in Berlin and it
is clear that Zhou had important Comintern connections, though the nature of these is disputed.[45] After
moving operations to Germany, Zhou regularly shuttled between Paris and Berlin.

Zhou returned to Paris by June 1922, where he was one of the twenty two participants present at the
organization of the Chinese Youth Communist Party, established as the European Branch of the Chinese
Communist Party.[note 6] Zhou helped draft the party's charter and was elected to the three member
executive committee as director of propaganda.[46] He also wrote for and helped edit the party magazine,
Shaonian (Youth), later renamed Chiguang (Red Light). It was in Zhou's capacity as general editor of this
magazine that Zhou first met Deng Xiaoping, only seventeen years old, whom Zhou hired to operate a
mimeograph (copy) machine.[47] The party went through several reorganizations and name changes, but
Zhou remained a key member of the group throughout his stay in Europe. Other important activities Zhou
undertook included recruiting and transporting students for the University of the Toilers of the East in
Moscow, and the establishment of the Chinese Nationalist Party (Kuomintang or KMT) European branch.

In June 1923, the Third Congress of the Chinese Communist Party accepted the Comintern's instructions to
ally with the KMT, led at the time by Sun Yat-sen. These instructions called for CCP members to join the
Nationalist Party as "individuals", while still retaining their association with the CCP. After joining the
KMT, they would work to lead and direct it, transforming it into a vehicle of revolution. Within several
years, this strategy would become the source of serious conflict between the KMT and the CCP.[48]

As well as joining the KMT, Zhou helped organise the founding of the Nationalist Party European branch
in November 1923. Under Zhou's influence, most of the European branch's officers were in fact
communists. Zhou's wide-ranging contacts and personal relationships formed during this period were
central to his career. Important party leaders, such as Zhu De and Nie Rongzhen, were first admitted to the
party by Zhou.

By 1924, the Soviet-Nationalist alliance was expanding rapidly and Zhou was summoned back to China
for further work. He left Europe probably in late July 1924,[note 7] returning to China as one of the most
senior Chinese Communist Party members in Europe.

Political and military work in Whampoa

Establishment in Guangzhou

Zhou returned to China in late August or early September 1924 to join the Political Department of the
Whampoa Military Academy, probably through the influence of Zhang Shenfu, who had previously
worked there.[49] The exact positions Zhou held at Whampoa and the dates he held them are not clear. A
few months after his arrival, possibly October 1924, he became
deputy director of the Academy's Political Department, and later,
possibly November 1924, director of the department.[note 8]. Even
though it was technically responsible to the central government,
Zhou's political department operated under a direct mandate to
indoctrinate Whampoa's cadets in the ideology of the KMT for the
purpose of improving loyalty and morale. While he was serving in
Whampoa, Zhou was also made the secretary of the Communist
Party of Guandong-Guangxi, and served as the CCP representative
with the rank of major-general.[51]

The island of Whampoa, ten miles downriver from Guangzhou,

was at the heart of the Soviet-Nationalist Party alliance. Conceived
as the training center of the Nationalist Party Army, it was to
provide the military base from which the Nationalists would launch
their campaign to unify China, which was split into dozens of
military satrapies. From its beginning, the school was funded,
armed, and partly staffed by the Soviets.[52] Zhou Enlai as the director of the
Political Department at Whampoa
The Political Department, where Zhou worked, was responsible for
Military Academy (1924)
political indoctrination and control. As a result, Zhou was a
prominent figure at most Academy meetings, often addressing the
school immediately after commandant Chiang Kai-shek. He was extremely influential in establishing the
political department/party representative (commissar) system which was adopted in Nationalist armed
forces in 1925.[53]

Concurrent with his Whampoa appointment, Zhou became secretary of the Communist Party's Guangdong
Provincial Committee, and at some point a member of the Provincial Committee's Military Section.[note 9]
Zhou vigorously extended Communist influence at the Academy. He soon arranged for a number of other
prominent Communists to join the Political Department, including Chen Yi, Nie Rongzhen, Yun Daiying
and Xiong Xiong.[54] Zhou played an important role in establishing the Young Soldiers Association, a
youth group which was dominated by the Communists, and Sparks, a short-lived Communist front group.
He thus recruited numerous new Communist party members from cadet ranks, and eventually set up a
covert Communist Party branch at the academy to direct the new members.[55] When Nationalists
concerned with the increasing number of Communist members and organizations at Whampoa set up a
"Society for Sun Yat-senism", Zhou attempted to squelch it; the conflict between these student groups set
the background for Zhou's removal from the academy.[56]

Military activities

Zhou participated in two military operations conducted by the Nationalist regime in 1925, later known as
the first and second Eastern Expeditions. The first was in January 1925 when Chen Jiongming, an
important Cantonese military leader previously driven out of Guangzhou by Sun Yat-sen, attempted to
retake Guangzhou. The Nationalist regime's campaign against Chen consisted of forces from the
Guangdong Army under Xu Chongzhi, and two training regiments of the Nationalist Party Army, led by
Chiang Kai-shek and staffed by Academy officers and cadets.[57][note 10] The fighting lasted through May
1925, with the defeat, but not destruction, of Chen's forces.[58] Zhou accompanied the Whampoa cadets on
the expedition as a political officer.
When Chen regrouped and attacked Guangzhou again in
September 1925, the Nationalists launched a second expedition.
Nationalist forces by this time had been reorganized into five corps
(or armies), and adopted the commissar system with Political
Departments and Nationalist party representatives in most divisions.
The First Corps, made up of the Nationalist Party Army, was led by
Whampoa graduates and commanded by Chiang Kai-shek, who
personally appointed Zhou director of the First Corps Political
Department.[59] Soon after, the Nationalist Party's Central
Executive Committee appointed Zhou Nationalist Party party
representative, making Zhou chief commissar of the First Corps.[60]
The first major battle of expedition saw the capture of Chen's base
in Huizhou on 15 October. Shantou was taken on 6 November, and
by the end of 1925, the Nationalists controlled all of Guangdong
province.

Zhou's appointment as chief commissar of the First Corps allowed

him to appoint Communists as commissars in four of the Corps'
five divisions.[61] Following the conclusion of the Expedition,
Zhou was appointed special commissioner for the East River
District, which placed him in temporary administrative control of
several counties; he apparently used this opportunity to establish a Chiang Kai-shek (center) and Zhou
Communist party branch in Shantou and strengthen the CCP's Enlai (left) with cadets at Whampoa
control of local unions.[62] This marked the high point of Zhou's Military Academy (1924)
time at Whampoa.

Political activities

In personal terms, 1925 was also an important year for Zhou. Zhou had kept in touch with Deng Yingchao,
whom he had met in the Awakening Society while in Tianjin; and, in January 1925, Zhou asked for and
received permission from CCP authorities to marry Deng. The two married in Guangzhou on 8 August
1925.[63]

Zhou's work at Whampoa came to an end with the Zhongshan Warship Incident of 20 March 1926, in
which a gunboat with a mostly Communist crew moved from Whampoa to Guangzhou without Chiang's
knowledge or approval. This event led to Chiang's exclusion of Communists from the Academy by May
1926, and the removal of numerous Communists from high positions in the Nationalist Party. In his
memoirs, Nie Rongzhen suggested that the gunboat had moved in protest of Zhou Enlai's (brief) arrest.[55]

Zhou's time in Whampoa was a significant period in his career. His pioneering work as a political officer in
the military made him an important Communist Party expert in this key area; much of his later career
centered on the military. Zhou's work in the CCP Guangdong Regional Committee Military Section was
typical of his covert activities in the period. The Section was a secret group consisting of three members of
the Provincial Central Committee, and was first responsible for organizing and directing CCP nuclei in the
army itself. These nuclei, organized at the regimental level and above, were "illegal", meaning they were
formed without Nationalist knowledge or authorization. The Section was also responsible for organizing
similar nuclei in other armed groups, including secret societies and key services such as railroads and
waterways. Zhou did extensive work in these areas until the final separation of the Nationalist and
Communist parties and the end of the Soviet-Nationalist alliance in 1927.[64]
Nationalist-Communist split

Extent of cooperation

Zhou's activities immediately after his removal from his positions at Whampoa are uncertain. An earlier
biographer claims that Chiang Kai-shek put Zhou in charge of "an advanced training center for the CCP
members and commissars withdrawn from the army".[65] More recent Chinese Communist sources claim
that Zhou had an important role at this time in securing Communist control of Ye Ting's Independent
Regiment. The regiment and Ye Ting later played a leading role in the Communists' first major military
action, the Nanchang Revolt.[55]

In July 1926, the Nationalists began the Northern Expedition, a massive military attempt to unify China.
The Expedition was led by Chiang Kai-shek and the National Revolutionary Army (NRA), an amalgam of
earlier military forces with significant guidance from Russian military advisors and numerous Communists
as both commanding and political officers. With the early successes of the Expedition, there was soon a
race between Chiang Kai-shek leading the "right-wing" of the Nationalist Party and the Communists,
running inside the "left-wing" of the Nationalists, for control of major southern cities such as Nanjing and
Shanghai. At this point the Chinese portion of Shanghai was controlled by Sun Chuanfang, one of the
militarists targeted by the North Expedition. Distracted by fighting with the NRA and defections from his
army, Sun reduced his forces in Shanghai, and the Communists, whose party headquarters was located in
Shanghai, made three attempts to seize control of the city, later called "the three Shanghai Uprisings", in
October 1926, February 1927 and March 1927.

Activities in Shanghai

Zhou was transferred to Shanghai to assist in these activities,

probably in late 1926. It seems he was not present for the first
uprising on 23–24 October,[66] but he was certainly in Shanghai
by December 1926. Early accounts credit Zhou with labor
organizing activities in Shanghai after his arrival, or, more
credibly, working to "strengthen the indoctrination of political
workers in labor unions and smuggle arms for the strikers."[67]
Reports that Zhou "organized" or "ordered" the second and third
uprisings on 20 February and 21 March exaggerate his role.
Major decisions during this period were made by the Communist
head in Shanghai, Chen Duxiu, the Party's general secretary, with
a special committee of eight party officials coordinating
Communist actions. The committee also consulted closely on
decisions with the Comintern representatives in Shanghai, headed
by Grigori Voitinsky.[68] The partial documentation available for
this period shows that Zhou headed the Communist Party Central
Committee's Military Commission in Shanghai.[69] He Zhou Enlai (1927)
participated in both the February and March actions, but was not
the guiding hand in either event, instead working with A. P.
Appen, the Soviet military advisor to the Central Committee, training the pickets of the General Labor
Union, the Communist controlled labor organization in Shanghai. He also worked to make union strong
arm squads more effective when the Communists declared a "Red Terror" after the failed February
uprising; this action resulted in the murder of twenty "anti-union" figures, and the kidnapping, beating, and
intimidation of others associated with anti-union activities.[70]
The third Communist uprising in Shanghai took place from 20 to 21 March. 600,000 rioting workers cut
power and telephone lines and seized the city's post office, police headquarters, and railway stations, often
after heavy fighting. During this uprising, the insurrectionists were under strict orders not to harm
foreigners, which they obeyed. The forces of Sun Chuanfang withdrew and the uprising was successful,
despite the small number of armed forces available. The first Nationalist troops entered the city the next
day.[71]

As the Communists attempted to install a soviet municipal government, conflict began between the
Nationalists and Communists, and on 12 April Nationalist forces, including both members of the Green
Gang and soldiers under the command of Nationalist general Bai Chongxi attacked the Communists and
quickly overcame them. On the eve of the Nationalist attack, Wang Shouhua, who was both the head of the
CCP Labor Committee and the Chairman of the General Labor Committee, accepted a dinner invitation
from "Big-eared Du" (a Shanghai gangster) and was strangled after he arrived. Zhou himself was nearly
killed in a similar trap, when he was arrested after arriving at a dinner held at the headquarters of Si Lie, a
Nationalist commander of Chiang's Twenty-sixth Army. Despite rumors that Chiang had put a high price
on Zhou's head, he was quickly released by Bai Chongxi's forces. The reasons for Zhou's sudden release
may have been that Zhou was then the most senior Communist in Shanghai, that Chiang's efforts to
exterminate the Shanghai Communists were highly secretive at the time, and that his execution would have
been noticed as a violation of the cooperation agreement between the CCP and the KMT (which was
technically still in effect). Zhou was finally only released after the intervention of a representative of the
Twenty-sixth Army, Zhao Shu, who was able to convince his commanders that the arrest of Zhou had been
a mistake.[72]

Flight from Shanghai

Fleeing Shanghai, Zhou made his way to Hankou (now part of Wuhan), and was a participant at the CCP's
5th National Congress there from 27 April to 9 May. At the end of the Congress, Zhou was elected to the
Party's Central Committee, again heading the military department.[73] After Chiang Kai-shek's suppression
of the Communists, the Nationalist Party split in two, with the Nationalist Party's "left-wing" (led by Wang
Jingwei) controlling the government in Hankou, and the party "right-wing" (led by Chiang Kai-shek)
establishing a rival government in Nanjing. Still following Comintern instructions, the Communists
remained as a "bloc inside" the Nationalist Party, hoping to continue expanding their influence through the
Nationalists.[74] After being attacked by a warlord friendly to Chiang, Wang's leftist government
disintegrated later in May 1927, and Chiang's troops began an organized purge of Communists in territories
formerly controlled by Wang.[75] In mid-July Zhou was forced to go underground.[74]

Pressured by their Comintern advisors, and themselves convinced that the "revolutionary high tide" had
arrived, the Communists decided to launch a series of military revolts.[76] The first of these was the
Nanchang Revolt. Zhou was sent to oversee the event, but the moving figures seem to have been Tan
Pingshan and Li Lisan, while the main military figures were Ye Ting and He Long. In military terms, the
revolt was a disaster, with the Communists' forces decimated and scattered.[77]

Zhou himself contracted malaria during the campaign, and was secretly sent to Hong Kong for medical
treatment by Nie Rongzhen and Ye Ting. After reaching Hong Kong, Zhou was disguised as a
businessman named "Li", and entrusted to the care of local Communists. In a subsequent meeting of the
CCP Central Committee, Zhou was blamed for the failure of the Nanchang campaign and temporarily
demoted to being an alternate member of the Politburo.[78]

Activities during the Chinese Civil War

The Sixth Party Congress

After the failure of the Nanchang Uprising, Zhou left China for the Soviet Union to attend the Chinese
Communist Party's (CCP) Sixth National Party Congress in Moscow, in June–July 1928.[79] The Sixth
Congress had to be held in Moscow because conditions in China were considered dangerous. KMT control
was so tight that many Chinese delegates attending the Sixth Congress were forced to travel in disguise:
Zhou himself was disguised as an antiquarian.[80]

At the Sixth Congress, Zhou delivered a long speech insisting that conditions in China were not favorable
for immediate revolution, and that the main task of the CCP should be to develop revolutionary momentum
by winning over the support of the masses in the countryside and establishing a Soviet regime in southern
China, similar to the one that Mao Zedong and Zhu De were already establishing around Jiangxi. The
Congress generally accepted Zhou's assessment as accurate. Xiang Zhongfa was made secretary general of
the Party, but was soon found incapable of fulfilling his role, so Zhou emerged as the de facto leader of the
CCP. Zhou was only thirty years old.[80]

During the Sixth Congress, Zhou was elected Director of the Central Committee Organization Department.
His ally, Li Lisan, took over propaganda work. Zhou finally returned to China, after more than a year
abroad, in 1929. At the Sixth Congress in Moscow, Zhou had given figures indicating that, by 1928, fewer
than 32,000 union members remained who were loyal to the Communists, and that only ten percent of
Party members were proletarians. By 1929, only three percent of the Party were proletarians.[81]

In early 1930, Zhou began to disagree with the timing of Li Lisan's strategy of favoring rich peasants and
concentrating military forces for attacks on urban centers. Zhou did not openly break with these more
orthodox notions, and even tried to implement them later, in 1931, in Jiangxi.[82] When the Soviet agent
Pavel Mif arrived in Shanghai to lead the Comintern in China in December 1930, Mif criticized Li's
strategy as "left adventurism", and criticized Zhou for compromising with Li. Zhou "acknowledged" his
mistakes in compromising with Li in January 1931 and offered to resign from the Politburo, but was
retained while other senior CCP leaders, including Li Lisan and Qu Qiubai, were removed. Like Mao later
recognized, Mif understood that Zhou's services as Party leader were indispensable, and that Zhou would
willingly cooperate with whoever was holding power.[83]

Underground work: establishment

After arriving back in Shanghai in 1929, Zhou began to work underground, establishing and overseeing a
network of independent Communist cells. Zhou's greatest danger in his underground work was the threat of
being discovered by the KMT secret police, which had been established in 1928 with the specific mission
of identifying and eliminating Communists. In order to avoid detection, Zhou and his wife changed
residences at least once a month, and used a variety of aliases. Zhou often disguised himself as a
businessman, sometimes wearing a beard. Zhou was careful that only two or three people ever knew his
whereabouts. Zhou disguised all urban Party offices, made sure that CCP offices never shared the same
buildings when in the same city, and required all Party members to use passwords to identify one another.
Zhou restricted all of his meetings to either before 7AM or after 7PM. Zhou never used public
transportation, and avoided being seen in public places.[84]

In November 1928, the CCP also established its own intelligence agency (the "Special Service section of
the Central Committee", or "Zhongyang Teke" (Chinese: 中央特科 ), often abbreviated as "Teke"), which
Zhou subsequently came to control. Zhou's chief lieutenants were Gu Shunzhang, who had strong ties to
Chinese secret societies and became an alternate member of the Politburo, and Xiang Zhongfa. Teke had
four operational sections: one for the protection and safety of Party members; one for intelligence gathering;
one for facilitating internal communications; and, one to conduct assassinations, a team that became known
as the "Red Squad" ( 红队 ).[85]

Zhou's main concern in running Teke was to establish an effective anti-espionage network within the KMT
secret police. Within a short amount of time the head of Teke's intelligence section, Chen Geng, succeeded
in planting a large network of moles inside the Investigation Section of the Central Operations Department
in Nanjing, which was the center of KMT intelligence. The three most successful agents used by Zhou to
infiltrate the KMT secret police were Qian Zhuangfei, Li Kenong, and Hu Di, whom Zhou referred to as
"the three most distinguished intelligence workers of the Party" in the 1930s. Agents planted within various
KMT offices were later critical in the survival of the CCP, helping the Party escape Chiang's Encirclement
Campaigns.[86]

KMT response to Zhou's intelligence work

In late April 1931 Zhou's chief aide in security affairs, Gu

Shunzhang, was arrested by the KMT in Wuhan. Gu was a former
labor organizer with strong mafia connections and weak
commitments to the CCP. Under threat of heavy torture, Gu gave
the KMT secret police detailed accounts of underground CCP
organizations in Wuhan, leading to the arrest and executions of
over ten senior CCP leaders in the city. Gu offered to provide the
KMT with details of CCP activities in Shanghai, but only if he
could give the information directly to Chiang Kai-shek.[87]

One of Zhou's agents working in Nanjing, Qian Zhuangfei,

intercepted a telegram requesting further instructions from Nanjing
on how to proceed, and abandoned his cover to personally warn
Zhou of the impending crackdown. The two days before Gu
arrived in Nanjing to meet with Chiang gave Zhou time to evacuate
Party members and to change the communication codes used by
Teke, all of which were known to Gu. After meeting briefly with Zhou Enlai (1930s)
Chiang in Nanjing, Gu arrived in Shanghai and assisted the KMT
secret police in raiding CCP offices and residences, capturing
members who could not be evacuated in time. The summary executions of those suspected of Communist
sympathies resulted in the largest death-toll since the Shanghai massacre of 1927.[88]

Zhou's reaction to Gu's betrayal was extreme. More than fifteen members of Gu's family, some of whom
worked for Teke, were murdered by the Red Squad and buried in quiet residential areas of Shanghai. The
Red Squad then assassinated Wang Bing, a leading member of the KMT secret police who was known for
moving around Shanghai in rickshaws, without the protection of bodyguards. Most surviving CCP
members were relocated to the Communist base in Jiangxi. Because most senior staff had become exposed
by Gu, most of its best agents were also relocated. Zhou's most senior aide not yet under suspicion, Pan
Hannian, became Teke's director.[89]

The night before he was scheduled to leave Shanghai in June 1931, Xiang Zhongfa, who was one of
Zhou's most senior agents, decided to spend the night in a hotel with his mistress, ignoring Zhou's warnings
about the danger. In the morning, a KMT informant who had been trailing Xiang spotted him as he was
leaving the hotel. Xiang was immediately arrested and imprisoned within the French Concession. Zhou
attempted to prevent Xiang's expected extradition to KMT-controlled China by having his agents bribe the
chief of police in the French Concession, but the KMT authorities appealed directly to the authorities of the
French Concession, ensuring that the chief of police could not intervene. Zhou's hopes that Xiang would be
transferred to Nanjing, giving him an opportunity to kidnap Xiang, also came to naught. The French agreed
to transfer Xiang to the Shanghai Garrison Headquarters, under the command of General Xiong Shihui,
who subjected Xiang to relentless torture and interrogation. Once he became convinced that Xiang had
given his torturers all the information that they requested, Chiang Kai-shek ordered Xiang to be
executed.[90]

Zhou Enlai later succeeded in secretly purchasing a copy of Xiang's interrogation records. The records
showed that Xiang had disclosed everything to the KMT authorities before his execution, including the
location of Zhou's residence. Another round of arrests and executions followed Xiang's capture, but Zhou
and his wife were able to escape capture because they had abandoned their apartment on the morning of
Xiang's arrest. After establishing a new Politburo Standing Committee in Shanghai, Zhou and his wife
relocated to the Communist base in Jiangxi near the end of 1931.[90] By the time Zhou left Shanghai, he
was one of the most wanted men in China.[91]

The Jiangxi Soviet

Following the failed Nanchang and Autumn Harvest Uprisings of 1927, the Communists began to focus on
establishing a series of rural bases of operation in southern China. Even before moving to Jiangxi, Zhou
had become involved in the politics of these bases. Mao, claiming the need to eliminate
counterrevolutionaries and Anti-Bolsheviks operating within the CCP, began an ideological purge of the
populace inside the Jiangxi Soviet. Zhou, perhaps due to his own success planting moles within various
levels of the KMT, agreed that an organized campaign to uncover subversion was justified, and supported
the campaign as de facto leader of the CCP.[92]

Mao's efforts soon developed into a ruthless campaign driven by paranoia and aimed not only at KMT
spies, but at anyone with an ideological outlook different from Mao's. Suspects were commonly tortured
until they confessed to their crimes and accused others of crimes, and wives and relatives who inquired of
those being tortured were themselves arrested and tortured even more severely. Mao's attempts to purge the
Red Army of those who might potentially oppose him led Mao to accuse Chen Yi, the commander and
political commissar of the Jiangxi Military Region, as a counterrevolutionary, provoking a violent reaction
against Mao's persecutions that became known as the "Futian Incident" in January 1931. Mao was
eventually successful in subduing the Red Army, reducing its numbers from forty thousand to less than ten
thousand. The campaign continued throughout 1930 and 1931. Historians estimate the total number who
died due to Mao's persecution in all base areas to be approximately one hundred thousand.[93]

The entire campaign occurred while Zhou was still in Shanghai. Although he had supported the elimination
of counterrevolutionaries, Zhou actively suppressed the campaign when he arrived in Jiangxi in December
1931, criticizing the "excess, the panic, and the oversimplification" practiced by local officials. After
investigating those accused of Anti-Bolshevism, and those persecuting them, Zhou submitted a report
criticizing the campaign for focusing on the narrow persecution of anti-Maoists as anti-Bolshevists,
exaggerating the threat to the Party, and condemning the use of torture as an investigative technique. Zhou's
resolution was passed and adopted on 7 January 1932, and the campaign gradually subsided.[94]

Zhou moved to the Jiangxi base area and shook up the propaganda-oriented approach to revolution by
demanding that the armed forces under Communist control actually be used to expand the base, rather than
just to control and defend it. In December 1931, Zhou replaced Mao Zedong as Secretary of the First Front
Army with Xiang Ying, and made himself political commissar of the Red Army, in place of Mao. Liu
Bocheng, Lin Biao and Peng Dehuai all criticized Mao's tactics at the October 1932 Ningdu
Conference.[95][96]
After moving to Jiangxi, Zhou met Mao for the first time since 1927, and began his long relationship with
Mao as his superior. In the Ningdu conference, Mao was demoted to being a figurehead in the Soviet
government. Zhou, who had come to appreciate Mao's strategies after the series of military failures waged
by other Party leaders since 1927, defended Mao, but was unsuccessful. After achieving power, Mao later
purged or demoted those who had opposed him in 1932, but remembered Zhou's defense of his
policies.[97]

Chiang's Encirclement Campaigns

In early 1933, Bo Gu arrived with the German Comintern adviser Otto Braun and took control of party
affairs. Zhou at this time, apparently with strong support from Party and military colleagues, reorganized
and standardized the Red Army. Under Zhou, Bo, and Braun, the Red Army defeated four attacks by
Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalist troops.[98] The military structure that led the Communists to victory was:

Leaders Unit Designation

Lin Biao, Nie Rongzhen 1st Corps
Peng Dehuai, Yang Shangkun 3rd Corps
Xiao Jinguang 7th Corps
Xiao Ke 8th Corps
Luo Binghui 9th Corps
Fang Zhimin 10th Corps

Chiang's fifth campaign, launched in September 1933, was much more difficult to contain. Chiang's new
use of "blockhouse tactics" and larger numbers of troops allowed his army to advance steadily into
Communist territory, and they succeeded in seizing several major Communist strongholds. Bo Gu and Otto
Braun adopted orthodox tactics to respond to Chiang, and Zhou, although personally opposed to them,
directed these. Following their subsequent defeat, he and other military leaders were blamed.[99]

Although Zhou's subsequently cautious military approach was distrusted by hardliners, he was again
appointed to the position of vice chairman of the Military Commission. Zhou was accepted as leader largely
because of his organizational talent and devotion to work, and because he had never shown any overt
ambition to pursue supreme power within the Party. Within months, the continuing orthodox tactics of Bo
and Braun led to a serious defeat for the Red Army, and forced the leaders of the CCP to seriously consider
abandoning their bases in Jiangxi.[100]

The Long March

After the decision to abandon Jiangxi was announced, Zhou was placed in charge of organizing and
supervising the logistics of the Communist withdrawal. Making his plans in absolute secrecy and waiting
till the last moment to inform even senior leaders of the group's movements, Zhou's objective was to break
through the enemy encirclement with as few casualties as possible, and before Chiang's forces were able to
completely occupy all Communist bases. It is not known what criteria were used to determine who would
stay and who would go, but 16,000 troops and some of the Communists' most notable commanders at the
time (including Xiang Ying, Chen Yi, Tan Zhenlin, and Qu Qiubai) were left to form a rear guard to divert
the main force of Nationalist troops from noticing the Communists' general withdrawal.[101]
The withdrawal of 84,000 soldiers and civilians began in
early October 1934. Zhou's intelligence agents were
successful in identifying a large section of Chiang's
blockhouse lines that were manned by troops under General
Chen Jitang, a Guangdong warlord who Zhou identified as
being likely to prefer preserving the strength of his troops
over fighting. Zhou sent Pan Hannian to negotiate for safe
passage with General Chen, who subsequently allowed the
Red Army to pass through the territory that he controlled
without fighting.[102]
Zhou (far left) with Mao Zedong (center-left)
in Yan'an (1935)
After passing through three of the four blockhouse
fortifications needed to escape Chiang's encirclement, the Red
Army was finally intercepted by regular Nationalist troops,
and suffered heavy casualties. Of the 86,000 Communists who attempted to break out of Jiangxi, only
36,000 successfully escaped. This loss demoralized some Communist leaders (particularly Bo Gu and Otto
Braun), but Zhou remained calm and retained his command.[102]

During the Communists' subsequent Long March, there were numerous high-level disputes over the
direction that the Communists should take, and on the causes of the Red Army's defeats. During the power
struggles that ensued, Zhou consistently backed Mao Zedong against the interests of Bo Gu and Otto
Braun. Bo and Braun were later blamed for the Red Army's defeats, and were eventually removed from
their positions of leadership.[103] The Communists eventually succeeded in re-establishing a base in
northern Shaanxi on 20 October 1935, arriving with only 8,000–9,000 remaining members.[104]

Zhou's position within the CCP changed numerous times throughout the Long March. By the early 1930s,
Zhou was recognized as the de facto leader of the CCP, and exercised superior influence over other
members of the CCP even when sharing power with Bo and Braun.[105] In the months following the
January 1935 Zunyi Conference, in which Bo and Braun were removed from senior positions, Zhou
mostly retained his position because he displayed a willingness to display responsibility, because his tactics
in defeating Chiang's Fourth Encirclement Campaign were recognized as being successful, and because he
supported Mao Zedong, who was gaining influence inside the Party: after the Zunyi Conference, Mao
became Zhou's assistant.[106] After the Communists reached Shaanxi and completed the Long March, Mao
officially took over Zhou Enlai's leading position in the CCP, while Zhou took a secondary position as
vice-chairman. Mao and Zhou would retain their positions within the CCP until their deaths in 1976.[107]

The Xi'an Incident

During the seventh congress of the Comintern, held in August 1936, Wang Ming issued an anti-Fascist
manifesto, indicating that the CCP's previous policy of "opposing Chiang Kai-shek and resisting Japan"
was to be replaced by a policy of "uniting with Chiang Kai-shek to resist Japan". Zhou was instrumental in
carrying out this policy. Zhou made contact with one of the most senior KMT commanders in the
northwest, Zhang Xueliang. By 1935, Zhang was well known for his anti-Japanese sentiments and his
doubts about Chiang's willingness to oppose the Japanese. Zhang's disposition made him easily influenced
by Zhou's indications that the CCP would cooperate to fight against the Japanese.[108]

Zhou established a "northeast working committee" for the purpose of promoting cooperation with Zhang.
The committee worked to persuade Zhang's Northeast Army to unite with the Red Army to fight Japan and
retake Manchuria. The committee also created new patriotic slogans, including "Chinese must not fight
Chinese", to promote Zhou's goals. Using his network of secret contacts, Zhou arranged a meeting with
Zhang in Yan'an, then controlled by Zhang's "Northeast Army".[109]
The first meeting between Zhou and Zhang occurred inside a
church on 7 April 1936. Zhang showed a great interest in ending
the civil war, uniting the country, and fighting the Japanese, but
warned that Chiang was firmly in control of the national
government, and that these goals would be difficult to pursue
without Chiang's cooperation. Both parties ended their meeting
with an agreement to find a way to secretly work together. At the
same time that Zhou was establishing secret contacts with Zhang,
Chiang was growing suspicious of Zhang, and became increasingly
Zhou with Communist general Ye
dissatisfied with Zhang's inaction against the Communists. In order
Jianying (left) and Kuomintang
to deceive Chiang, Zhou and Zhang deployed mock military units
official Zhang Zhong (center) in Xi'an
in order to give the impression that the Northeast Army and the
1937, illustrating the alliance
Red Army were engaged in battle.[109]
between the two parties which was
the outcome of the Xi'an Incident
In December 1936, Chiang Kai-shek flew to the Nationalist
headquarters in Xi'an in order to test the loyalty of local KMT
military forces under Marshal Zhang Xueliang, and to personally
lead these forces in a final attack on Communist bases in Shaanxi, which Zhang had been ordered to
destroy. Determined to force Chiang to direct China's forces against the Japanese (who had taken Zhang's
territory of Manchuria and were preparing a broader invasion), on 12 December Zhang and his followers
stormed Chiang's headquarters, killed most of his bodyguards, and seized the Generalissimo in what
became known as the Xi'an Incident.[110]

Reactions to Chiang's kidnapping in Yan'an were mixed. Some, including Mao Zedong and Zhu De,
viewed it as an opportunity to have Chiang killed. Others, including Zhou Enlai and Zhang Wentian, saw it
as an opportunity to achieve a united-front policy against the Japanese, which would strengthen the overall
position of the CCP.[111] Debate within Yan'an ended when a long telegram from Joseph Stalin arrived,
urging the CCP to work towards Chiang's release, explaining that a united front was the best position from
which to resist the Japanese, and that only Chiang had the prestige and authority to carry out such a
plan.[112]

After initial communications with Zhang on the fate of Chiang, Zhou Enlai reached Xi'an on 16 December,
on a plane specifically sent for him by Zhang Xueliang, as the chief Communist negotiator. At first, Chiang
was opposed to negotiating with a CCP delegate, but withdrew his opposition when it became clear that his
life and freedom were largely dependent on Communist goodwill towards him. On 24 December, Chiang
received Zhou for a meeting, the first time that the two had seen each other since Zhou had left Whampoa
over ten years earlier. Zhou began the conversation by saying: "In the ten years since we have met, you
seem to have aged very little." Chiang nodded and said: "Enlai, you were my subordinate. You should do
what I say." Zhou replied that if Chiang would halt the civil war and resist the Japanese instead, the Red
Army would willingly accept Chiang's command. By the end of this meeting, Chiang promised to end the
civil war, to resist the Japanese together, and to invite Zhou to Nanjing for further talks.[111]

On 25 December 1936, Zhang released Chiang and accompanied him to Nanjing. Subsequently, Zhang
was court-martialed and sentenced to house arrest, and most of the officers who participated in the Xi'an
Incident were executed. Although the KMT formally rejected collaboration with the CCP, Chiang ended
active military activity against Communist bases in Yan'nan, implying that he had implicitly given his word
to change the direction of his policies. Following the end of KMT attacks, the CCP was able to consolidate
its territories and to prepare to resist the Japanese.[113]

After news arrived that Zhang had been betrayed and arrested by Chiang, Zhang's old officer corps became
very agitated, and some of them murdered a Nationalist general, Wang Yizhe, who was seen as largely
responsible for the military's lack of response. While Zhou was still in Xi'an, he himself was surrounded in
his office by a number of Zhang's officers, who accused the Communists of instigating the Xi'an Incident
and of betraying Zhang by convincing the general to travel to Nanjing. At gunpoint, they threatened to kill
Zhou. Ever the diplomat, Zhou maintained his composure and eloquently defended his position. In the end,
Zhou succeeded in calming the officers, and they departed, leaving him unharmed.

In a series of negotiations with the KMT that lasted until June 1937 (when the Marco Polo Bridge Incident
occurred), Zhou attempted to gain Zhang's release, but failed.[114]

Activities during World War II

Propaganda and intelligence in Wuhan

When the Nationalist capital of Nanjing fell to the Japanese on 13 December 1937, Zhou accompanied the
Nationalist government to its temporary capital of Wuhan. As the chief representative of the CCP in the
nominal KMT-CCP cooperation agreement, Zhou established and headed the official KMT-CCP liaison
office. While running the liaison office, Zhou established the Yangtze Bureau of the Central Committee.
Under cover of its association with the Eighth Route Army, Zhou used the Yangtze Bureau to conduct
clandestine operations within southern China, secretly recruiting Communist operatives and establishing
Party structures throughout KMT-controlled areas.[115]

In August 1937, the CCP secretly issued orders to Zhou that his united front work was to focus on
Communist infiltration and organization at all levels of the government and society. Zhou agreed to these
orders, and applied his considerable organizational talents to completing them. Shortly after Zhou's arrival
in Wuhan, he convinced the Nationalist government to approve and fund a Communist newspaper, Xinhua
ribao ("New China Daily"), justifying it as a tool to spread anti-Japanese propaganda. This newspaper
became a major tool for spreading Communist propaganda, and the Nationalists later viewed its approval
and funding as one of their "biggest mistakes".[116]

Zhou was successful in organizing large numbers of Chinese intellectuals and artists to promote resistance
against the Japanese. The largest propaganda event that Zhou staged was a week-long celebration in 1938,
following the successful defense of Taierzhuang. In this event, between 400,000 and 500,000 people took
part in parades, and a chorus of over 10,000 people sung songs of resistance. Fundraising efforts during the
week raised over a million yuan. Zhou himself donated 240 yuan, his monthly salary as deputy director of
the Political Department.[116]

While he was working in Wuhan, Zhou was the CCP's main contact person with the outside world, and
worked hard to reverse the public perception of the Communists as a "bandit organization". Zhou
established and maintained contacts with over forty foreign journalists and writers, including Edgar Snow,
Agnes Smedley, Anna Louise Strong and Rewi Alley, many of whom became sympathetic to the
Communist cause and wrote about their sympathies in foreign publications. In sympathy with his efforts to
promote the CCP to the outside world, Zhou arranged for a Canadian medical team, headed by Norman
Bethune, to travel to Yan'an, and assisted the Dutch film director Joris Ivens in producing a documentary,
400 Million People.[117]

Zhou was unsuccessful in averting the public defection of Zhang Guotao, one of the founders of the CCP,
to the KMT. Zhang was prepared to defect due to a disagreement with Mao Zedong over the
implementation of the united front policy, and because he resented Mao's authoritarian leadership style.
Zhou, with the aid of Wang Ming, Bo Gu and Li Kenong, intercepted Zhang after he arrived in Wuhan,
and engaged in extensive negotiations through April 1938, in order to convince Zhang not to defect, but
these negotiations were unsuccessful. In the end, Zhang refused to compromise and placed himself under
the protection of the KMT secret police. On 18 April, the CCP Central Committee expelled Zhang from the
Party, and Zhang himself issued a statement accusing the CCP of sabotaging efforts to resist the Japanese.
The entire episode was a serious setback for Zhou's attempts to improve the prestige of the Party.[118]

Military strategy in Wuhan

In January 1938, the Nationalist government appointed Zhou as the deputy director to the Political
Department of the Military Committee, working directly under General Chen Cheng. As a senior
Communist statesman holding the rank of lieutenant-general, Zhou was the only Communist to hold a high-
level position within the Nationalist government. Zhou used his influence within the Military Committee to
promote Nationalist generals that he believed were capable, and to promote cooperation with the Red
Army.[115]

In the Tai'erzhuang campaign, Zhou used his influence to ensure that the most capable Nationalist general
available, Li Zongren be appointed overall commander, despite Chiang's reservations about Li's loyalty.
When Chiang was hesitant to commit troops to the defense of Tai'erzhuang, Zhou convinced Chiang to do
so by promising that the Communist Eighth Route Army would simultaneously attack the Japanese from
the north, and that the New Fourth Army would sabotage the Tianjin-Pukou railroad, cutting off Japanese
supplies. In the end, the defense of Tai'erzhuang was a major victory for the Nationalists, killing 20,000
Japanese soldiers and capturing a large amount of supplies and equipment.[115]

Adoption of orphans

While serving as the CCP ambassador to the KMT, the childless

Zhou met and befriended numerous orphans. While in Wuhan
Zhou adopted a young girl, Sun Weishi, in 1937. Sun's mother had
taken her to Wuhan after Sun's father was executed by the KMT in
1927, during the White Terror. Zhou came upon the sixteen-year-
old Sun crying outside of the Eighth Route Army Liaison Office
because she had been refused permission to travel to Yan'an, due to
her youth and lack of political connections. After Zhou befriended
and adopted her as his daughter, Sun was able to travel to Yan'an.
She pursued a career in acting and direction, and later became the
first female director of spoken drama (huaju) in the PRC.[119]

Zhou also adopted Sun's brother, Sun Yang.[120] After

accompanying Zhou to Yan'an, Sun Yang became Zhou's personal
assistant. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, Sun
Yang became the president of Renmin University.[119]
Zhou (left) with his wife Deng
In 1938 Zhou met and befriended another orphan, Li Peng. Li was Yingchao (center) and Sun Weishi
only three when, in 1931, his father was also killed by the
Kuomintang. Zhou subsequently looked after him in Yan'an. After
the war, Zhou systematically groomed Li for leadership and sent him to be educated in energy-related
engineering in Moscow. Zhou's placement of Li within the powerful energy bureaucracy shielded Li from
Red Guards during the Cultural Revolution, and Li's eventual rise to the level of Premier surprised no
one.[121]

Flight to Chongqing
When the Japanese army approached Wuhan in the fall of 1938, the Nationalist Army engaged the
Japanese in the surrounding regions for over four months, allowing the KMT to withdraw farther inland, to
Chongqing, bringing with them important supplies, assets, and many refugees. While he was en route to
Chongqing, Zhou was nearly killed in the "fire of Changsha", which lasted for three days, destroyed two
thirds of the city, killed twenty thousand civilians, and left hundreds of thousands of people homeless. This
fire was deliberately caused by the retreating Nationalist army in order to prevent the city from falling to the
Japanese. Due to an organizational error (it was claimed), the fire was begun without any warning to the
residents of the city.[122]

After escaping from Changsha, Zhou took refuge in a Buddhist temple in a nearby village and organized
the evacuation of the city. Zhou demanded that the causes of the fire be thoroughly investigated by
authorities, that those responsible be punished, that reparations be given to the victims, that the city be
thoroughly cleaned up, and that accommodations be provided for the homeless. In the end, the Nationalists
blamed three local commanders for the fire and executed them. Newspapers across China blamed the fire
on (non-KMT) arsonists, but the blaze contributed to a nationwide loss of support for the KMT.[123]

Early activities in Chongqing

Zhou Enlai reached Chongqing in December 1938, and resumed the official and unofficial operations that
he had been conducting in Wuhan in January 1938. Zhou's activities included those required by his formal
positions within the Nationalist government, his running of two pro-Communist newspapers, and his covert
efforts to form reliable intelligence networks and increase the popularity and organization of CCP
organizations in southern China. At its peak, the staff working under him in both official and covert roles
totaled several hundred people.[124] After finding that his father, Zhou Shaogang, was unable to support
himself, Zhou looked after his father in Chongqing until his father's death in 1942.[125]

Soon after arriving in Chongqing, Zhou successfully lobbied the Nationalist government to release
Communist political prisoners. After their release, Zhou often assigned these former prisoners as agents to
organize and lead Party organizations throughout southern China. The efforts of Zhou's covert activities
were extremely successful, increasing CCP membership across southern China tenfold within months.
Chiang was somewhat aware of these activities and introduced efforts to suppress them, but was generally
unsuccessful.[126]

In July 1939, while in Yan'an to attend a series of Politburo

meetings, Zhou had an accident horseback riding in which he fell
and fractured his right elbow. Because there was little medical care
available in Yan'an, Zhou traveled to Moscow for medical
treatment, using the occasion to brief the Comintern on the status of
the united front. Zhou arrived in Moscow too late to mend the
fracture, and his right arm remained bent for the rest of his life.
Joseph Stalin was so displeased with the CCP's refusal to work
more closely with the Nationalists that he refused to see Zhou
during his stay.[127] Zhou's adopted daughter, Sun Weishi,
accompanied Zhou to Moscow. She remained in Moscow after Zhou Enlai and Sun Weishi in
Zhou left in order to study for a career in theatre.[119] Moscow, 1939.

Intelligence work in Chongqing

On 4 May 1939, the Politburo accepted Zhou's assessment that Zhou should focus his efforts on creating a
network of secret CCP agents working covertly and for long periods. Communists were directed to join the
KMT, if doing so would increase the ability of agents to infiltrate the KMT administrative, educational,
economic, and military establishments. Under the cover of the Office of the Eighth Route Army (moved to
a stately building on the outskirts of Chongqing), Zhou adopted a series of measures to expand the CCP
intelligence network.[128]

By the time that Zhou returned to Chongqing in May 1940, a serious rift had formed between the KMT
and the CCP. Over the course of the next year, the relationship between the two parties degenerated into
arrests and executions of Party members, covert attempts by agents of both sides to eliminate each other,
propaganda efforts attacking each other, and major military clashes. The united front was officially
abolished after the Anhui Incident in January 1941, when 9,000 Communist soldiers of the New Fourth
Army were ambushed, and their commanders either killed or imprisoned by government troops.[129]

Zhou responded to the rift between the KMT and CCP by directing Party leaders to conduct their
operations more secretly. He maintained propaganda efforts via the newspapers that he directed and kept in
close contact with foreign journalists and ambassadors. Zhou increased and improved CCP intelligence
efforts within the KMT, Wang Jingwei's Nanjing government, and the Empire of Japan, recruiting, training,
and organizing a large network of Communist spies. Yan Baohang, a secret Party member active in
Chongqing diplomatic circles, informed Zhou that German dictator Adolf Hitler was planning to attack the
Soviet Union on 22 June 1941. Under Zhou's signature, this information reached Stalin on 20 June, two
days before Hitler attacked.[130]

Economic and diplomatic activities

Despite worsening relations with Chiang Kai-shek, Zhou operated openly in Chongqing, befriending
Chinese and foreign visitors and staging public cultural activities, especially Chinese theater. Zhou
cultivated a close personal friendship with General Feng Yuxiang, making it possible for Zhou to circulate
freely among the officers of the Nationalist Army. Zhou befriended the General He Jifeng, and convinced
He to secretly become a member of the CCP during an official visit to Yan'an. Zhou's intelligence agents
penetrated the Sichuanese army of General Deng Xihou, resulting in Deng's secret agreement to supply
ammunition to the Communist New Fourth Army. Zhou convinced another Sichuanese general, Li
Wenhui, to covertly install a radio transmitter that facilitated secret communication between Yan'an and
Chongqing. Zhou befriended Zhang Zhizhong and Nong Yun, commanders in the Yunnan armed forces,
who became secret CCP members, agreed to cooperate with the CCP against Chiang Kai-shek, and
established a clandestine radio station that broadcast Communist propaganda from the provincial
government building in Kunming.[131]

Zhou remained the primary CCP representative to the outside world during his time in Chongqing. Zhou
and his aides Qiao Guanhua, Gong Peng and Wang Bingnan enjoyed receiving foreign visitors and made a
favorable impression among American, British, Canadian, Russian, and other foreign diplomats. Zhou
struck visitors as charming, urbane, hard-working, and living a very simple lifestyle. In 1941, Zhou
received a visit from Ernest Hemingway and his wife, Martha Gellhorn. Gellhorn later wrote that she and
Ernest were extremely impressed with Zhou (and extremely unimpressed with Chiang), and they became
convinced that the Communists would take over China after meeting him.[132]

Because Yan'an was incapable of funding Zhou's activities, Zhou partially funded his efforts though
donations from sympathetic foreigners, overseas Chinese, and the China Defense League (supported by
Sun Yat-sen's widow, Soong Ching-ling). Zhou also undertook to start and run a number of businesses
throughout KMT- and Japanese- controlled China. Zhou's businesses grew to include several trading
companies operating in several Chinese cities (primarily Chongqing and Hong Kong), a silk and satin store
in Chongqing, an oil refinery, and factories for producing industrial materials, cloths, Western medicines,
and other commodities.[133]

Under Zhou, Communist businessmen made great profits in currency trading and commodity speculation,
especially in American dollars and gold. Zhou's most lucrative business was generated by several opium
plantations that Zhou established in remote areas. Although the CCP had been engaged in the eradication
of opium smoking since its establishment, Zhou justified opium production and distribution in KMT-
controlled areas by the huge profits generated for the CCP, and by the debilitating effects that opium
addiction might have on KMT soldiers and government officials.[133]

Relationship with Mao Zedong

In 1943, Zhou's relationship with Chiang Kai-shek deteriorated, and he returned permanently to Yan'an. By
then, Mao Zedong had emerged as the Chairman of the Chinese Communist Party, and was attempting to
have his political theories (literally "Mao Zedong Thought") accepted as the Party's dogma. Following his
ascent to power, Mao organized a campaign to indoctrinate the members of the CCP. This campaign
became the foundation of the Maoist personality cult that later dominated Chinese politics until the end of
the Cultural Revolution.[134]

After returning to Yan'an, Zhou Enlai was strongly and excessively criticized in this campaign. Zhou was
labelled, along with the generals Peng Dehuai, Liu Bocheng, Ye Jianying, and Nie Rongzhen, as an
"empiricist" because he had a history of cooperating with the Comintern and with Mao's enemy, Wang
Ming. Mao publicly attacked Zhou as "a collaborator and assistant of dogmatism... who belittled the study
of Marxism-Leninism". Mao and his allies then claimed that the CCP organizations that Zhou had
established in southern China were in fact led by KMT secret agents, a charge which Zhou firmly denied,
and which was only withdrawn after Mao became convinced of Zhou's subservience in the latest period of
the campaign.[134]

Zhou defended himself by engaging in a long series of public reflections and self-criticisms, and he gave a
number of speeches praising Mao and Mao Zedong Thought and giving his unconditional acceptance of
Mao's leadership. He also joined Mao's allies in attacking Peng Shuzhi, Chen Duxiu, and Wang Ming, who
Mao viewed as enemies. The persecution of Zhou Enlai distressed Moscow, and Georgi Dimitrov wrote a
personal letter to Mao indicating that "Zhou Enlai... must not be severed from the Party." In the end, Zhou's
enthusiastic acknowledgement of his own faults, his praise for Mao's leadership, and his attacks on Mao's
enemies eventually convinced Mao that Zhou's conversion to Maoism was genuine, a precondition for
Zhou's political survival. By the seventh congress of the CCP in 1945, Mao was acknowledged as the
overall leader of the CCP, and the dogma of Mao Zedong Thought was firmly entrenched among the
Party's leadership.[134]

Diplomatic efforts with the United States

The Dixie mission

As United States began to plan for an invasion of Japan, which at that point they assumed would be based
in China, American political and military leaders became eager to make contact with the Communists. In
June 1944, Chiang Kai-shek reluctantly agreed to allow an American military observation group, known as
the "Dixie mission", to travel to Yan'an. Mao and Zhou welcomed this mission and held numerous talks in
the interests of gaining American aid. They pledged support for any future American military actions to
attack the Japanese in China, and attempted to convince the Americans that the CCP was committed to a
united KMT-CCP government. In a gesture of goodwill, communist guerrilla units were instructed to
rescue downed American airmen. By the time the Americans left Yan'an, many had become convinced that
the CCP was "a party seeking orderly democratic growth towards socialism", and the mission formally
suggested greater cooperation between the CCP and the American military.[135]

1944–1945

In 1944, Zhou wrote to General Joseph Stilwell, the American commander of the China Burma India war
theater, attempting to convince Stilwell of the need for the Americans to supply the Communists, and of the
Communist's desire for a united Chinese government after the war. Stilwell's open disenchantment with the
Nationalist government in general, and with Chiang Kai-shek specifically, motivated President Franklin D.
Roosevelt to remove him that same year, before Zhou's diplomacy could be effective. Stilwell's
replacement, Patrick J. Hurley, was receptive to Zhou's appeals, but ultimately refused to align the
American military with the CCP unless the Party made concessions to the KMT, which Mao and Zhou
found unacceptable. Soon after Japan surrendered in 1945, Chiang invited Mao and Zhou to Chongqing to
take part in an American-endorsed peace conference.[136]

The Chongqing negotiations

There was widespread apprehension in Yan'an that the invitation from Chiang was a trap, and that the
Nationalists were planning to assassinate or imprison the two instead. Zhou took control over Mao's
security detail, and his subsequent inspections of their plane and lodgings found nothing. Throughout the
trip to Chongqing, Mao refused to enter his accommodations until they had been personally inspected by
Zhou. Mao and Zhou traveled together to receptions, banquets, and other public gatherings, and Zhou
introduced him to numerous local celebrities and statesmen that he had befriended during his earlier stay in
Chongqing.[137]

During the forty-three days of negotiations, Mao and Chiang met eleven times to discuss the conditions of
post-war China, while Zhou worked on confirming the details of the negotiations. In the end, the
negotiations resolved nothing. Zhou's offer to withdraw the Red Army from southern China was ignored,
and P.J. Hurley's ultimatum to incorporate the CCP into the KMT insulted Mao. After Mao returned to
Yan'an on 10 October 1945, Zhou stayed behind to sort out the details of the conference's resolution. Zhou
returned to Yan'an on 27 November 1945, when major skirmishes between the Communists and
Nationalists made future negotiations pointless. Hurley himself subsequently announced his resignation,
accusing members of the US embassy of undermining him and favoring the Communists.[138]

The Marshall negotiations

After Harry S. Truman became President of the United States, he

nominated General George C. Marshall as his special envoy to
China on 15 December 1945. Marshall was charged with brokering
a ceasefire between the CCP and KMT, and to influence both Mao
and Chiang to abide by the Chongqing agreement, which both had
signed. The top leadership within the CCP, including Zhou, viewed
Marshall's nomination as a positive development, and hoped that
Marshall would be a more flexible negotiator than Hurley had The Marshall Mission (1946), left to
been. Zhou arrived in Chongqing to negotiate with Marshall on 22 right: Zhang Qun, George C.
December.[139] Marshall, Zhou Enlai
The first phase of talks went smoothly. Zhou represented the Communists, Marshall represented the
Americans, and Zhang Qun (later replaced by Zhang Zhizhong) represented the KMT. In January 1946
both sides agreed to cease hostilities, and to reorganize their armies on the principle of separating the army
from political parties. Zhou signed these agreements in the knowledge that neither side would be able to
implement these changes. Chiang delivered a speech promising political freedom, local autonomy, free
elections, and the release of political prisoners. Zhou welcomed Chiang's statements and expressed his
opposition to civil war.[140]

The leadership of the CCP viewed these agreements optimistically. On 27 January 1946 the CCP
Secretariat appointed Zhou as one of eight leaders to participate in a future coalition government (other
leaders included Mao, Liu Shaoqi, and Zhu De). It was suggested that Zhou be nominated as China's vice
president. Mao expressed a desire to visit the United States, and Zhou received orders to manipulate
Marshall in order to advance the peace process.[141]

Marshall's negotiations soon deteriorated, as neither the KMT nor the CCP were willing to sacrifice any of
the advantages that they had gained, to de-politicize their armies, or to sacrifice any degree of autonomy in
areas their side controlled. Military clashes in Manchuria became increasingly frequent in the spring and
summer of 1946, eventually forcing Communist forces to retreat after a few major battles. Government
armies increased their attacks in other parts of China.[142]

On 3 May 1946, Zhou and his wife left Chongqing for Nanjing, where the Nationalist capital returned.
Negotiations deteriorated, and on 9 October Zhou informed Marshall that he no longer had the confidence
of the CCP. On 11 October Nationalist troops seized the Communist city of Zhangjiakou in northern China.
Chiang, confident in his ability to defeat the Communists, called the National Assembly into session
without the participation of the CCP and ordered it to draft a constitution on 15 November. On 16
November Zhou held a press conference, in which he condemned the KMT for "tearing up the agreements
from the political consultative conference". On 19 November Zhou and the entire CCP delegation left
Nanjing for Yan'an.[143]

Resumption of Civil War

Military strategist and intelligence chief

Following the failure of negotiations, the Chinese Civil War resumed in earnest. Zhou turned his focus from
diplomatic to military affairs, while retaining a senior interest in intelligence work. Zhou worked directly
under Mao as his chief aide, as the vice chairman of the Military Commission of the Central Committee,
and as the general chief of staff. As the head of the Urban Work Committee of the Central Committee, an
agency established to coordinate work inside KMT-controlled areas, Zhou continued to direct underground
activities.[144]

A superior force of Nationalist troops captured Yan'an in March 1947, but Zhou's intelligence agents
(primarily Xiong Xianghui) were able to provide Yan'an's commanding general, Peng Dehuai, with details
of the KMT army's troop strength, distribution, positions, air cover, and dates of deployment. This
intelligence allowed Communist forces to avoid major battles and to engage Nationalist forces in a
protracted campaign of guerrilla warfare that eventually led to Peng achieving a series of major victories.
By February 1948 over half the KMT troops in the northwest were either defeated or exhausted. On 4 May
1948 Peng captured 40,000 army uniforms and over a million pieces of artillery. By January 1949
Communist forces seized Beijing and Tianjin, and were firmly in control of north China.[145]

Diplomacy
On 21 January 1949 Chiang stepped down as president of the Nationalist government and was succeeded
by General Li Zongren. On 1 April 1949 Li began a series of peace negotiations with a six-member CCP
delegation. The CCP delegates were led by Zhou Enlai, and the KMT delegates were led by Zhang
Zhizhong.[146]

Zhou began the negotiations by asking: "Why did you go to Xikou (where Chiang had retired) to see
Chiang Kai-shek before leaving Nanjing?" Zhang responded that Chiang still had power, even though he
had technically retired, and that his consent would be needed to finalize any agreement. Zhou responded
that the CCP would not accept a bogus peace dictated by Chiang, and asked whether Zhang had come with
the necessary credentials to implement the terms desired by the CCP. Negotiations continued until 15 April,
when Zhou produced a "final version" of a "draft agreement for internal peace", which was essentially an
ultimatum to accept CCP demands. The KMT government did not respond after five days, signaling that it
was not prepared to accept Zhou's demands.[147]

On 21 April Mao and Zhou issued an "order to the army for country-wide advance". PLA troops captured
Nanjing on 23 April, and captured Li's stronghold of Guangdong in October, forcing Li to go into exile in
America. In December 1949 PLA troops captured Chengdu, the last KMT-controlled city on mainland
China, forcing Chiang to evacuate to Taiwan.[147]

PRC diplomat and statesman

Diplomatic situation of the PRC in 1949

By the early 1950s, China's international influence was

extremely low. By the end of the Qing Dynasty in 1911,
China's pretensions of universalism had been shattered by a
string of military defeats and incursions by Europeans and
Japanese. By the end of Yuan Shikai's reign and the
subsequent Warlord Era, China's international prestige had
declined to "almost nothing". In World War II, China's
effective role was sometimes questioned by other Allied
leaders. The 1950–1953 Korean War greatly exacerbated
China's international position by fixing the United States in a
position of animosity, ensuring that Taiwan would remain
outside of PRC control and that the PRC would remain
outside of the United Nations for the foreseeable future.[148]

Following the establishment of the People's Republic of China

on 1 October 1949, Zhou was appointed both Premier of the
Government Administration Council (later replaced by the
State Council) and Minister of Foreign Affairs. Through the A portrait of Zhou Enlai
coordination of these two offices and his position as a member
of the five-man standing committee of the Politburo, Zhou
became the architect of early PRC foreign policy, presenting China as a new, yet responsible member of the
international community. By the early 1950s, Zhou was an experienced negotiator and was respected as a
senior revolutionary within China.[148]

Zhou's earliest efforts to improve the prestige of the PRC involved recruiting prominent Chinese politicians,
capitalists, intellectuals, and military leaders who were not technically affiliated with the CCP. Zhou was
able to convince Zhang Zhizhong to accept a position inside the PRC in 1949, after Zhou's underground
network successfully escorted Zhang's family to Beijing. All of the other members of the KMT delegation
that Zhou had negotiated with in 1949 accepted similar terms.[149]

Sun Yat-sen's widow, Soong Ching-ling, who was estranged from her family and who had opposed the
KMT for many years, readily joined the PRC in 1949. Huang Yanpei, a prominent industrialist who had
refused offers of a government post for many years, was persuaded to accept a position as vice premier in
the new government. Fu Zuoyi, the KMT commander who had surrendered the Beijing garrison in 1948,
was persuaded to join the PLA, and to accept a position as the minister of water conservation.[150]

Diplomacy with India

Zhou's first diplomatic successes came as the result of successfully pursuing a warm relationship, based on
mutual respect, with India's first post-independence prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru. Through his
diplomacy, Zhou managed to persuade India to accept China's occupation of Tibet in 1950 and 1951. India
was later persuaded to act as a neutral mediator between China and the United States during the many
difficult phases of the negotiations settling the Korean War.[151]

The Korean War

When the Korean War broke out on 25 June 1950, Zhou was in the process of demobilizing half of the
PLA's 5.6  million soldiers, under the direction of the Central Committee. Zhou and Mao discussed the
possibility of American intervention with Kim Il-sung in May, and urged Kim to be cautious if he was to
invade and conquer South Korea, but Kim refused to take these warnings seriously. On 28 June 1950, after
the United States pushed through a UN resolution condemning North Korean aggression and sent the
Seventh Fleet to "neutralize" the Taiwan Strait, Zhou criticized both the UN and US initiatives as "armed
aggression on Chinese territory."[152]

Although Kim's early success led him to predict that he would win the war by the end of August, Zhou and
other Chinese leaders were more pessimistic. Zhou did not share Kim's confidence that the war would end
quickly, and became increasingly apprehensive that the United States would intervene. To counter the
possibility of an American invasion into North Korea or China, Zhou secured a Soviet commitment to have
the USSR support Chinese forces with air cover, and deployed 260,000 Chinese soldiers along the North
Korean border, under the command of Gao Gang, but they were strictly ordered not to move into North
Korea or engage UN or USA forces unless they engaged themselves. Zhou commanded Chai Chengwen
to conduct a topographical survey of Korea, and directed Lei Yingfu, Zhou's military advisor in North
Korea, to analyze the military situation there. Lei concluded that MacArthur would most likely attempt a
landing at Incheon.[153]

On 15 September 1950 MacArthur landed at Incheon, met little resistance, and captured Seoul on 25
September. Bombing raids destroyed most North Korean tanks and much of its artillery. North Korean
troops, instead of withdrawing north, rapidly disintegrated. On 30 September, Zhou warned the United
States that "the Chinese people will not tolerate foreign aggression, nor will they supinely tolerate seeing
their neighbors being savagely invaded by imperialists."[154]

On 1 October, on the first anniversary of the PRC, South Korean troops crossed the Thirty-Eighth Parallel
into North Korea. Stalin refused to become directly involved in the war, and Kim sent a frantic appeal to
Mao to reinforce his army. On 2 October, the Chinese leadership continued an emergency meeting at
Zhongnanhai to discuss whether China should send military aid, and these talks continued until 6 October.
At the meeting, Zhou was one of the few firm supporters of Mao's position that China should send military
aid, regardless of the strength of American forces. With the endorsement of Peng Dehuai, the meeting
concluded with a resolution to send military forces to Korea.[155]

In order to enlist Stalin's support, Zhou traveled to Stalin's summer resort on the Black Sea on 10 October.
Stalin initially agreed to send military equipment and ammunition, but warned Zhou that the USSR's air
force would need two or three months to prepare any operations and no ground troops were to be sent. In a
subsequent meeting, Stalin told Zhou that he would only provide China with equipment on a credit basis,
and that the Soviet air force would only operate over Chinese airspace after an undisclosed period of time.
Stalin did not agree to send either military equipment or air support until March 1951.[156]

Immediately on his return to Beijing on 18 October 1950, Zhou met with Mao Zedong, Peng Dehuai, and
Gao Gang, and the group ordered the 200,000 Chinese troops along the border to enter North Korea,
which they did on 25 October. After consulting with Stalin, on 13 November, Mao appointed Zhou the
overall commander of the People's Volunteer Army, a special unit of the People's Liberation Army, China's
armed forces that would intervene in the Korean War and coordinator of the war effort, with Peng as field
commander of the PVA. Orders given by Zhou to the PVA were delivered in the name of the Central
Military Commission.[157]

By June 1951, the war had reached a stalemate around the Thirty-eighth Parallel, and the two sides agreed
to negotiate an armistice. Zhou directed the truce talks, which began on 10 July. Zhou chose Li Kenong
and Qiao Guanhua to head the Chinese negotiating team. The negotiations proceeded for two years before
reaching a ceasefire agreement in July 1953, formally signed at Panmunjom.[158]

The Korean War was Zhou's last military assignment. In 1952, Peng Dehuai succeeded Zhou in managing
the Central Military Commission (which Zhou had headed since 1947). In 1956, after the eighth Party
Congress, Zhou formally relinquished his post in the Military Commission and focused on his work in the
Standing Committee, the State Council, and on foreign affairs.[159]

Diplomacy with China's communist neighbors

After Stalin died on 5 March 1953, Zhou left for Moscow and
attended Stalin's funeral four days later. Mao, curiously, decided not
to travel to Moscow, possibly because no senior Soviet politician
had yet travelled to Beijing, or because Stalin had rejected an offer
to meet with Mao in 1948 (nevertheless, a huge memorial service in
honor of Stalin was held in Beijing's Tiananmen Square with Mao
and hundreds of thousands more in attendance). While in Moscow,
Zhou was notably received with considerable respect by Soviet
Zhou with Kim Il-sung at the signing
officials, being permitted to stand with the USSR's new leaders— of the Sino-North Korean Mutual Aid
Vyacheslav Molotov, Nikita Khrushchev, Georgy Malenkov, and and Cooperation Friendship Treaty in
Lavrentiy Beria—instead of with the other "foreign" dignitaries 1961
who attended. With these four leaders, Zhou walked directly
behind the gun carriage bearing Stalin's coffin. Zhou's diplomatic
efforts on his travel to Moscow were rewarded shortly after when, in 1954, Khrushchev himself visited
Beijing to take part in the fifth anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic.[146][160]

Throughout the 1950s, Zhou worked to tighten economic and political relations between China and other
Communist states, coordinating China's foreign policy with Soviet policies promoting solidarity among
political allies. In 1952, Zhou signed an economic and cultural agreement with the Mongolian People's
Republic, giving de facto recognition of the independence of what had been known as "Outer Mongolia"
in Qing times. Zhou also worked to conclude an agreement with Kim Il-sung in order to help the postwar
reconstruction of North Korea's economy. Pursuing the goals of peaceful diplomacy with China's
neighbors, Zhou held amicable talks with Burma's prime minister, U Nu, and promoted China's efforts to
send supplies to Ho Chi Minh's Vietnamese rebels known as the Vietminh.[148]

The Geneva Conference

In April 1954, Zhou traveled to Switzerland to attend the Geneva Conference, convened to settle the
ongoing Franco-Vietnamese War. His patience and shrewdness were credited with assisting the major
powers involved (the Soviets, French, Americans, and North Vietnamese) to iron out the agreement ending
the war. According to the negotiated peace, French Indochina was to be partitioned into Laos, Cambodia,
North Vietnam, and South Vietnam. Elections were agreed to be called within two years to create a
coalition government in a united Vietnam, and the Vietminh agreed to end their guerilla activities in South
Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia.[161]

During one early meeting in Geneva, Zhou found himself in the same room with the staunchly anti-
Communist American secretary of state, John Foster Dulles. After Zhou politely offered to shake his hand,
Dulles rudely turned his back and walked out of the room, saying "I cannot". Zhou was interpreted by
onlookers as turning this moment of possible humiliation into a small victory by giving only a small,
"Gallic-style" shrug to this behaviour. Zhou was equally effective in countering Dulles' insistence that
China not be given a seat at the sessions. Furthering the impression of Chinese urbanity and civility, Zhou
had lunch with British actor Charlie Chaplin, who had been living in Switzerland since being blacklisted in
the United States for his radical politics.[161]

The Asian–African Conference

In 1955, Zhou was a prominent participant in the Asian–African

Conference held in Indonesia. The conference in Bandung was a
meeting of twenty-nine African and Asian states, organized by
Indonesia, Burma (Myanmar), Pakistan, Ceylon (Sri Lanka), and
India, and was called largely to promote Afro-Asian economic and
cultural cooperation and to oppose colonialism or neocolonialism
by either the United States or the Soviet Union in the Cold War. At
the conference, Zhou skillfully gave the conference a neutral stance
that made the United States appear as a serious threat to the peace
and stability of the region. Zhou complained that, while China was
working towards "world peace and the progress of mankind",
"aggressive circles" within the United States were actively aiding
the Nationalists in Taiwan and planning to rearm the Japanese. He
was widely quoted for his remark that "the population of Asia will
never forget that the first atom bomb was exploded on Asian soil." Zhou Enlai and Sanusi Hardjadinata,
With the support of its most prestigious participants, the conference the chairman of the Bandung
produced a strong declaration in favor of peace, the abolition of Conference.
nuclear arms, general arms reduction, and the principle of universal
representation at the United Nations.[162]

On his way to the Bandung conference, an assassination attempt was made against Zhou when a bomb was
planted on the Air India plane Kashmir Princess, chartered for Zhou's trip from Hong Kong to Jakarta.
Zhou avoided the attempt when he changed planes at the last minute, but all 11 of the flight's other
passengers were killed, with only three crew members surviving the crash. A recent study has blamed the
attempt on "one of the intelligence agencies of the KMT."[163] Journalist Joseph Trento has also alleged
that there was a second attempt on Zhou's life at the Bandung conference involving "a bowl of rice
poisoned with a slow-acting toxin."[164]

According to one account based on recent research, Zhou found out about the bomb on the Kashmir
Princess after being warned of the plot by his own intelligence officers and did not attempt to stop it
because he viewed those that died as disposable: international journalists and low-level cadres. After the
crash, Zhou used the incident to warn the British about the KMT intelligence operatives active in Hong
Kong and pressured Great Britain to disable the Nationalist intelligence network operating there (with
himself playing a support role). He hoped that the incident would improve Britain's relationship with the
PRC, and damage Britain's relationship with the ROC.[165] The official explanation for Zhou's absence on
the flight, however, remains that Zhou was forced to change his schedule due to having had surgery for
appendicitis.[166]

After the Bandung conference, China's international political situation began to gradually improve. With the
help of many of the nonaligned powers who had taken part in the conference, the US-backed position
economically and politically boycotting the PRC began to erode, despite continuing American pressure to
follow its direction. In 1971 the PRC gained China's seat at the United Nations.[167]

Position on Taiwan

When the PRC was founded on 1 October 1949, Zhou notified all
governments that any countries wishing to have diplomatic contact
with the PRC must end their relationship with the leaders of the
former regime on Taiwan, and support the PRC's claim to China's
seat in the United Nations. This was the first foreign policy
document issued by the new government. By 1950 the PRC was
able to gain diplomatic relationships with other communist
countries and with thirteen non-communist countries, but talks with
most Western governments were unsuccessful.[168]

Zhou emerged from the Bandung conference with a reputation as a

flexible and open-minded negotiator. Recognizing that the United
States would back the de facto independence of ROC-controlled
Zhou and his wife Deng at the
Taiwan with military force, Zhou persuaded his government to end
Badaling section of the Great Wall of
the shelling of Quemoy and Matsu, and to search for a diplomatic China (1955)
alternative to the confrontation instead. In a formal announcement
in May 1955, Zhou declared that the PRC would "strive for the
liberation of Taiwan by peaceful means so far as it is possible."[169] Whenever the question of Taiwan was
raised with foreign statesmen, Zhou argued that Taiwan was part of China, and that the resolution of the
conflict with the Taiwan authorities was an internal matter.[170]

In 1958 the post of Minister of Foreign Affairs was passed to Chen Yi, a general with little prior diplomatic
experience. After Zhou resigned his office in Foreign Affairs, the PRC diplomatic corps was reduced
dramatically. Some were transferred to various cultural and educational departments to replace leading
cadres who had been labelled "rightists" and sent to work in labor camps.[171]

The Shanghai communique

By the early 1970s, Sino-American relations had begun to
improve. Mao's workers in the petroleum industry, one of
China's few growing economic sectors at the time, advised the
Chairman that, in order to consider growth at levels desired by
the Party's leadership, large imports of American technology
and technical expertise were essential. In January 1970, the
Chinese invited the American ping-pong team to tour China,
initiating an era of "ping-pong diplomacy".[172]

In 1971, Zhou Enlai met secretly with President Nixon's

security advisor, Henry Kissinger, who had flown to China to Zhou, shown here with Henry Kissinger
prepare for a meeting between Richard Nixon and Mao and Mao Zedong.
Zedong. During the course of these meetings, the United
States agreed to allow the transfer of American money to
China (presumably from relatives in the United States), to
allow American-owned ships to conduct trade with China
(under foreign flags), and to allow Chinese exports into the
United States for the first time since the Korean War. At the
time, these negotiations were considered so sensitive that they
were concealed from the American public, the State
Department, the American secretary of state, and all foreign
governments.[172]
Zhou shakes hands with President
On the morning of 21 February 1972, Richard Nixon arrived
Richard Nixon upon Nixon's arrival in
in Beijing, where he was greeted by Zhou, and later met with
China in February 1972.
Mao Zedong. The diplomatic substance of Nixon's visit was
resolved on 28 February, in the Shanghai Communique, which
summarized both sides' positions without attempting to resolve
them. The "US side" reaffirmed the American position that America's involvement in the ongoing Vietnam
War did not constitute "outside intervention" in Vietnam's affairs, and restated its commitment to
"individual freedom", and pledged continued support for South Korea. The "Chinese Side" stated that
"wherever there is oppression, there is resistance", that "all foreign troops should be withdrawn to their
own countries", and that Korea should be unified according to the demands of North Korea. Both sides
agreed to disagree on the status of Taiwan. The closing sections of the Shanghai Communique encouraged
further diplomatic, cultural, economic, journalistic, and scientific exchanges, and endorsed both sides'
intentions to work towards "the relaxation of tensions in Asia and the world." The resolutions of the
Shanghai Communique represented a major policy shift for both the United States and China.[173]

The Great Leap Forward

In 1958, Mao Zedong began the Great Leap Forward, aimed at increasing China's production levels in
industry and agriculture with unrealistic targets. As a popular and practical administrator, Zhou maintained
his position through the Leap. Zhou has been described by Frank Dikötter as the "midwife" of the Great
Leap Forward, who "transformed nightmares into reality".[174][175]

By the early 1960s, Mao's prestige was not as high as it had once been. Mao's economic policies in the
1950s had failed, and he had developed a lifestyle that was increasingly out of touch with many of his
oldest colleagues. Among the activities that seemed contrary to his popular image were the swims in his
private pool in Zhongnanhai, his many villas around China that he would travel to on a private train, his
private, book-lined study, and the companionship of an ever-changing succession of enthusiastic young
women whom he met either on weekly dances in Zhongnanhai or on his journeys by train. The
combination of his personal eccentricities and industrialization policy failures produced criticism from such
veteran revolutionaries as Liu Shaoqi, Deng Xiaoping, Chen Yun, and Zhou Enlai, who seemed less and
less to share an enthusiasm for his vision of continuous revolutionary struggle.[176]

The Cultural Revolution

Initial efforts of Mao and Lin

To improve his image and power, Mao, with the help of Lin Biao,
undertook a number of public propaganda efforts. Among the
efforts of Mao and Lin to improve Mao's image in the early 1960s
were Lin's publication of the Diary of Lei Feng and his compilation
of Quotations from Chairman Mao.[177] The last and most
successful of these efforts was the Cultural Revolution.

Whatever its other causes, the Cultural Revolution, declared in

1966, was overtly pro-Maoist, and gave Mao the power and
influence to purge the Party of his political enemies at the highest
levels of government. Along with closing China's schools and
universities, it exhorted of young Chinese to destroy old buildings,
temples, and art, and to attack their "revisionist" teachers, school
administrators, party leaders, and parents.[178] After the Cultural
Revolution was announced, many of the most senior members of
the CCP who had shared Zhou's hesitation in following Mao's Zhou at the outset of the Cultural
direction, including President Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping, were Revolution (with Lin Liheng, daughter
removed from their posts almost immediately; they, along with their of Lin Biao)
families, were subjected to mass criticism and humiliation.[178]

Political survival

Soon after they had been removed, Zhou argued that President Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping "should be
allowed to come back to work", but this was opposed by Mao, Lin Biao, Kang Sheng and Chen Boda.
Chen Boda even suggested that Zhou himself might be "considered counter-revolutionary" if he did not toe
the Maoist line.[179] Following the threats that he would share in the fate of his comrades if he did not
support Mao, Zhou ceased his criticisms and began to work more closely with the Chairman and his clique.

Zhou gave his backing to the establishment of radical Red Guard organizations in October 1966 and joined
Chen Boda and Jiang Qing against what they considered "leftist" and "rightist" Red Guard factions. This
opened the way for attacks on Liu Shaoqi, Deng Xiaoping, and Tao Zhu in December 1966 and January
1967.[180] By September 1968, Zhou candidly described his strategy for political survival to Japanese LDP
parliamentarians visiting Beijing: "one’s personal opinions should advance or beat a retreat according to the
direction of the majority."[181] When he was accused of being less than enthusiastic in following Mao's
leadership, he accused himself of "poor understanding" of Mao's theories, giving the appearance of
compromising with forces that he secretly loathed and referred to in private as his "inferno".[182] Following
the logic of political survival, Zhou worked to aid Mao, and restricted his criticisms to private
conversations.
Although Zhou escaped direct persecution, he was not able to save many of those closest to him from
having their lives destroyed by the Cultural Revolution. Sun Weishi, Zhou's adopted daughter, died in 1968
after seven months of torture, imprisonment, and rape by Maoist Red Guards. In 1968, Jiang also had his
adopted son (Sun Yang) tortured and murdered by Red Guards. After the end of the Cultural Revolution,
Sun's plays were re-staged as a way of criticizing the Gang of Four, whom many thought were responsible
for her death.[183]

Throughout the next decade, Mao largely developed policies while Zhou carried them out, attempting to
moderate some of the excesses of the Cultural Revolution, such as preventing Beijing from being renamed
"East Is Red City" (Chinese: 东方红市 ; pinyin: Dōngfānghóngshì) and the Chinese guardian lions in front
of Tian'anmen Square from being replaced with statues of Mao.[184] Zhou also ordered a PLA battalion to
guard the Forbidden City and protect its traditional artifacts from vandalism and destruction by Red
Guards.[185] Despite his best efforts, the inability to prevent many of the events of the Cultural Revolution
were a great blow to Zhou. Over the last decade of his life, Zhou's ability to implement Mao's policies and
keep the nation afloat during periods of adversity was so great that his practical importance alone was
sufficient to save him (with Mao's assistance) whenever Zhou became politically threatened.[186] At the
latest stages of the Cultural Revolution, in 1975, Zhou pushed for the "Four Modernizations" in order to
undo the damage caused by the Mao's policies.

During the later stages of the Cultural Revolution, Zhou became a target of political campaigns orchestrated
by Chairman Mao and the Gang of Four. The "Criticize Lin, Criticize Confucius" campaign of 1973 and
1974 was directed at Premier Zhou because he was viewed as one of the Gang's primary political
opponents. In 1975, Zhou's enemies initiated a campaign named "Criticizing Song Jiang, Evaluating the
Water Margin", which encouraged the use of Zhou as an example of a political loser.[187]

Death

Illness and death

According to a biography of Zhou by Gao Wenqian, a former researcher at the CPC's Party Documents
Research Office, Zhou was first diagnosed with bladder cancer in November 1972.[188] Zhou's medical
team reported that with treatment, he had a high chance of recovery; however, medical treatment for the
highest ranking party members had to be approved by Mao. Mao ordered that Zhou and his wife should not
be told of the diagnosis, no surgery should be performed, and no further examinations should be given.[189]
According to Ji Chaozhu, Zhou Enlai's personal interpreter, Henry Kissinger offered to send cancer
specialists from the United States to treat Zhou, an offer that would eventually be refused.[190] By 1974,
Zhou was experiencing significant bleeding in his urine. After pressure by other Chinese leaders who had
learned of Zhou's condition, Mao finally ordered a surgical operation to be performed in June 1974, but the
bleeding returned a few months later, indicating metastasis of the cancer into other organs. A series of
operations over the next year and a half failed to check the progress of the cancer.[191] Zhou continued to
conduct work during his stays in the hospital, with Deng Xiaoping, as the First Deputy Premier, handling
most of the important State Council matters. His last major public appearance was at the first meeting of the
4th National People's Congress on 13 January 1975, where he presented the government's work report. He
then fell out of the public eye for more medical treatment.[192] Zhou Enlai died from cancer at 09:57 on 8
January 1976, aged 77.

Mao's response
After Zhou's death, Mao issued no statements acknowledging Zhou's achievements or contributions and
sent no condolences to Zhou's widow, herself a senior Party leader.[193] Mao forbade his staff from
wearing black mourning armbands.[194] Whether or not Mao would have attended Zhou's funeral, which
was held in the Great Hall of the People, remains in question as Mao himself was in very poor health to do
so in any event.[194] Mao did however send a wreath to the funeral.[194]

Instead, Mao attacked a proposal to have Zhou publicly declared a great Marxist, and rejected a request that
he make a brief appearance at Zhou's funeral, instructing his nephew, Mao Yuanxin, to explain that he
could not attend because doing so would be seen as a public admission that he was being forced to "rethink
the Cultural Revolution", as Zhou's later years had been closely associated with reversing and moderating
its excesses. Mao worried that public expressions of mourning would later be directed against him and his
policies, and backed the "five nos" campaign to suppress public expressions of mourning for Zhou after the
late Premier's death.[195]

Memorial

Whatever Mao's opinion of Zhou may have been, there was general mourning among the public. Foreign
correspondents reported that Beijing, shortly after Zhou's death, looked like a ghost town. There was no
burial ceremony, as Zhou had willed his ashes to be scattered across the hills and rivers of his hometown,
rather than stored in a ceremonial mausoleum. With Zhou gone, it became clear how the Chinese people
had revered him, and how they had viewed him as a symbol of stability in an otherwise chaotic period of
history.[196] Zhou's death also brought condolences from nations around the world.

Vice-Premier Deng Xiaoping delivered the eulogy at Zhou's state funeral on 15 January 1976. Although
much of his speech echoed the wording of an official statement by the Central Committee immediately
following Zhou's death or consisted of a meticulous description of Zhou's remarkable political career, near
the end of the eulogy he offered a personal tribute to Zhou's character, speaking from the heart while
observing the rhetoric demanded of ceremonial state occasions.[197] Referring to Zhou, Deng stated that:

He was open and aboveboard, paid attention to the interests of the whole, observed Party
discipline, was strict in "dissecting" himself and good at uniting the mass of cadres, and upheld
the unity and solidarity of the Party. He maintained broad and close ties with the masses and
showed boundless warmheartedness towards all comrades and the people.... We should learn
from his fine style – being modest and prudent, unassuming and approachable, setting an
example by his conduct, and living in a plain and hard-working way. We should follow his
example of adhering to the proletarian style and opposing the bourgeois style of life[197]

Spence believed this statement was interpreted at the time as a subtle criticism of Mao and the other leaders
of the Cultural Revolution, who could not possibly be viewed or praised as being "open and aboveboard",
"good at uniting the mass of cadres", for displaying "warmheartedness", or for modesty, prudence, or
approachability. Regardless of Deng's intentions, the Gang of Four, and later Hua Guofeng, increased the
persecution of Deng shortly after he delivered this eulogy.[197]

Suppression of public mourning

After Zhou's single official memorial ceremony on 15 January, Zhou's political enemies within the Party
officially prohibited any further displays of public mourning. The most notorious regulations prohibiting
Zhou from being honoured were the poorly observed and poorly enforced "five nos": no wearing black
armbands, no mourning wreaths, no mourning halls, no memorial activities, and no handing out photos of
Zhou. Years of resentment over the Cultural Revolution, the public persecution of Deng Xiaoping (who
was strongly associated with Zhou in public perception), and the prohibition against publicly mourning
Zhou became associated with each other shortly after Zhou's death, leading to popular discontent against
Mao and his apparent successors (notably Hua Guofeng and the Gang of Four).[198]

Official attempts to enforce the "five nos" included removing public memorials and tearing down posters
commemorating his achievements. On 25 March 1976, a leading Shanghai newspaper, Wenhui Bao,
published an article stating that Zhou was "the capitalist roader inside the Party [who] wanted to help the
unrepentant capitalist roader [Deng] regain his power". This and other propaganda efforts to attack Zhou's
image only strengthened the public's attachment to Zhou's memory.[199] Between March and April 1976, a
forged document circulated in Nanjing that claimed itself to be Zhou Enlai's last will. It attacked Jiang Qing
and praised Deng Xiaoping, and was met with increased propaganda efforts by the government.[200]

The Tiananmen Incident

Within several months after the death of Zhou, one of the most extraordinary spontaneous events in the
history of the PRC occurred. On 4 April 1976, at the eve of China's annual Qingming Festival, in which
Chinese traditionally pay homage to their deceased ancestors, thousands of people gathered around the
Monument to the People's Heroes in Tiananmen Square to commemorate the life and death of Zhou Enlai.
On this occasion, the people of Beijing honoured Zhou by laying wreaths, banners, poems, placards, and
flowers at the foot of the Monument.[201] The most obvious purpose of this memorial was to eulogize
Zhou, but Jiang Qing, Zhang Chunqiao, and Yao Wenyuan were also attacked for their alleged evil actions
against the Premier. A small number of slogans left at Tiananmen even attacked Mao himself, and his
Cultural Revolution.[202]

Up to two million people may have visited Tiananmen Square on 4 April.[202] First-hand observations of
the events in Tiananmen Square on 4 April report that all levels of society, from the poorest peasants to
high-ranking PLA officers and the children of high-ranking cadres, were represented in the activities.
Those who participated were motivated by a mixture of anger over the treatment of Zhou, revolt against
Mao and his policies, apprehension for China's future, and defiance of those who would seek to punish the
public for commemorating Zhou's memory. There is nothing to suggest that events were coordinated from
any position of leadership: it was a spontaneous demonstration reflecting widespread public sentiment.
Deng Xiaoping was notably absent, and he instructed his children to avoid being seen at the square.[203]

On the morning of 5 April, crowds gathering around the memorial arrived to discover that it had been
completely removed by the police during the night, angering them. Attempts to suppress the mourners led
to a violent riot, in which police cars were set on fire and a crowd of over 100,000 people forced its way
into several government buildings surrounding the square.[201]

By 6:00 pm, most of the crowd had dispersed, but a small group remained until 10:00 pm, when a security
force entered Tiananmen Square and arrested them. (The reported figure of those arrested was 388 people,
but was rumored to be far higher.) Many of those arrested were later sentenced to "people's trial" at Peking
University, or were sentenced to prison work camps. Incidents similar to those which occurred in Beijing
on 4 and 5 April occurred in Zhengzhou, Kunming, Taiyuan, Changchun, Shanghai, Wuhan, and
Guangzhou. Possibly because of his close association with Zhou, Deng Xiaoping was formally stripped of
all positions "inside and outside the Party" on 7 April, following this "Tiananmen Incident".[201]

After ousting Hua Guofeng and assuming control of China in 1980, Deng Xiaoping released those arrested
in the Tiananmen Incident as part of a broader effort to reverse the effects of the Cultural Revolution.

Legacy
By the end of his lifetime, Zhou was widely viewed as representing
moderation and justice in Chinese popular culture.[198] Since his
death, Zhou Enlai has been regarded as a skilled negotiator fluent in
foreign languages, a master of policy implementation, a devoted
revolutionary, and a pragmatic statesman with an unusual attentiveness
to detail and nuance. He was also known for his tireless and dedicated
work ethic, and his unusual charm and poise in public. He was
reputedly the last Mandarin bureaucrat in the Confucian tradition.
Zhou's political behaviour should be viewed in light of his political
philosophy as well as his personality. To a large extent, Zhou
epitomized the paradox inherent in a Communist politician with
traditional Chinese upbringing: at once conservative and radical,
pragmatic and ideological, possessed of a belief in order and harmony
as well as a faith, which he developed very gradually over time, in the
progressive power of rebellion and revolution. Statue of Zhou and Deng in the
Memorial to Zhou Enlai and Deng
Though a firm believer in the Communist ideal on which the People's Yingchao in Tianjin.
Republic was founded, Zhou is widely credited to have moderated the
excesses of Mao's radical policies within the limits of his power.[204] It
has been assumed that he successfully protected several imperial and religious sites of cultural significance
(such as the Potala Palace in Lhasa and Forbidden City in Beijing) from the Red Guards, and shielded
many top-level leaders, including Deng Xiaoping, as well as many officials, academics and artists from
purges.[204] Deng Xiaoping was quoted as saying Zhou was "sometimes forced to act against his
conscience in order to minimize the damage" stemming from Mao's policies.[204]

While many earlier Chinese leaders today have been subjected to criticism inside China, Zhou's image has
remained positive among contemporary Chinese. Many Chinese continue to venerate Zhou as possibly the
most humane leader of the 20th century, and the CPC today promotes Zhou as a dedicated and self-
sacrificing leader who remains a symbol of the Communist Party.[205] Even historians who list Mao's faults
generally attribute the opposite qualities to Zhou: Zhou was cultured and educated where as Mao was crude
and simple; Zhou was consistent where as Mao was unstable; Zhou was stoic where as Mao was
paranoid.[206] Following the death of Mao, Chinese press emphasized in particular his consultative, logical,
realistic, and cool-headed leadership style.[207]

However, recent academic criticism of Zhou has focused on his late

relationship with Mao, and his political activities during the
Cultural Revolution, arguing that the relationship between Zhou
and Mao may have been more complex than is commonly
portrayed. Zhou has been depicted as unconditionally submissive
and extremely loyal to Mao and his allies, going out of his way to
support or permit the persecution of friends and relatives in order to
avoid facing political condemnation himself. After the founding of
the PRC, Zhou was unable or unwilling to protect the former spies
that he had employed in the Chinese Civil War and the Second
World War, who were persecuted for their wartime contacts with
the enemies of the CCP. Early in the Cultural Revolution, he told
Jiang Qing "From now on you make all the decisions, and I'll make
sure they're carried out," and publicly declared that his old Zhou with his niece Zhou Bingde
comrade, Liu Shaoqi, "deserved to die" for opposing Mao. In the
effort to avoid being persecuted for opposing Mao, Zhou passively
accepted the political persecution of many others, including his own brother.[206][208][209]
A popular saying within China once compared Zhou to a budaoweng (a tumbler), which can imply that he
was a political opportunist. Dr. Li Zhisui, then one of Mao's personal physicians, characterized Zhou as
such and was severely critical of Zhou in his book The Private Life of Chairman Mao, describing him as
"Mao's slave, absolutely obsequiously obedient... Everything he did, he did to be loyal to Mao. Neither he
nor [Deng Yingchao] had a shred of independent thought".[210] Li also described Mao's contradictory
relationship with Zhou as one where he demanded total loyalty, "but because Zhou was so subservient and
loyal, Mao held [Zhou] in contempt".[211] Some observers have criticized him as being too diplomatic:
avoiding clear stands in complex political situations and instead becoming ideologically elusive,
ambiguous, and enigmatic.[204][205] Several explanations have been offered to explain his elusiveness.
Dick Wilson, the former chief editor of the Far Eastern Economic Review, writes that Zhou's only option
"was to go on pretending to support the [Cultural Revolution] movement, while endeavoring to deflect its
successes, blunt its mischief and stanch the wounds it was inflicting."[212] This explanation for Zhou's
elusiveness was also widely accepted by many Chinese after his death.[204] Wilson also writes that Zhou
"would have been hounded out of his position of influence, removed from control of the Government"
were he to "make a stand and demand that Mao call off the campaign or bring the Red Guards to
heel."[212]

Zhou's involvement in the Cultural Revolution is thus defended by many on the grounds that he had no
choice other than political martyrdom. Due to his influence and political ability, the entire government may
have collapsed without his cooperation. Given the political circumstances of the last decade of Zhou's life,
it is unlikely that he would have survived a purge without cultivating the support of Mao through active
assistance.[186]

Zhou received a great deal of praise from American statesmen who met him in 1971. Henry Kissinger
wrote that he had been extremely impressed with Zhou's intelligence and character, describing him as
"equally at home in philosophy, reminiscence, historical analysis, tactical probes, humorous repartee... [and]
could display an extraordinary personal graciousness." Kissinger called Zhou "one of the two or three most
impressive men I have ever met,"[213] stating that "his commands of facts, in particular his knowledge of
American events and, for that matter, of my own background, was stunning."[214] In his memoirs, Richard
Nixon stated that he was impressed with Zhou's exceptional "brilliance and dynamism".[206]

After coming to power, Deng Xiaoping may have overemphasized

Zhou Enlai's achievements to distance the Communist Party from Mao's "Mao dominated any
Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution, both of which had gathering; Zhou suffused it.
seriously weakened the Party's prestige. Deng observed that Mao's Mao's passion strove to
disastrous policies could no longer represent the Party's finest hour, but overwhelm opposition;
that the legacy and character of Zhou Enlai could. Furthermore, Deng Zhou's intellect would seek
received credit for enacting successful economic policies that Zhou to persuade or outmaneuver
initially proposed.[216] By actively associating itself with an already it. Mao was sardonic; Zhou
popular Zhou Enlai, Zhou's legacy may have been used (and possibly penetrating. Mao thought of
distorted) as a political tool of the Party after his death.[186] himself as a philosopher;
Zhou saw his role as an
Zhou remains a widely commemorated figure in China today. After the administrator or a negotiator.
founding of the People's Republic of China, Zhou ordered his Mao was eager to accelerate
hometown of Huai'an not to transform his house into a memorial and history; Zhou was content to
not to keep up the Zhou family tombs. These orders were respected exploit its currents."
within Zhou's lifetime, but today his family home and traditional family
school have been restored, and are visited by a large number of tourists
every year. In 1998, Huai'an, in order to commemorate Zhou's one —Former U.S. Secretary of
hundredth birthday, opened a vast commemorative park with a museum State Henry Kissinger, On
dedicated to his life. The park includes a reproduction of Xihuating, China (2011)[215]
Zhou's living and working quarters in Beijing.[125]
The city of Tianjin has established a museum to Zhou and his wife
Deng Yingchao, and the city of Nanjing has erected a memorial
commemorating Communist negotiations in 1946 with the
Nationalist government which features a bronze statue of
Zhou.[217] Stamps commemorating the first anniversary of Zhou's
death were issued in 1977, and in 1998 to commemorate his 100th
birthday.

The 2013 historical drama film The Story of Zhou Enlai features
the trip of Zhou Enlai in May 1961 during the Great Leap Forward,
when he investigated the rural situation in Huaxi of Guiyang and a
former revolutionary base Boyan Township of Hebei.

Works
Zhou Enlai (1981). Selected Works of Zhou Enlai (http://
book.theorychina.org/upload/8c8341c6-71df-464e-9544- A bronze statue of Zhou in Nanjing,
a850a742a101/). Vol. I (1st ed.). Beijing: Foreign wearing a Western suit (something
Languages Press. ISBN 0-8351-2251-4. he never wore after his youth)
— (1989). Selected Works of Zhou Enlai (http://book.the
orychina.org/upload/ffa60e80-a69f-428e-905c-169338d0
c892/). Vol. II (1st ed.). Beijing: Foreign Languages Press. ISBN 0-8351-2251-4.

See also
History of the People's Republic of China
History of the Chinese Communist Party
Chinese Civil War
Second Sino-Japanese War
Chiang Kai-shek
Kuomintang
Whampoa Military Academy
Zhou Enlai: The Last Perfect Revolutionary by Gao Wenqian
Long March
Xi'an Incident
Bandung Conference
Geneva Conference
Shanghai Communique
Great Leap Forward
Tiananmen Incident
Former Residence of Zhou Enlai in Huai'an
Former Residence of Zhou Enlai in Shanghai
Kashmir Princess

Notes
1. During the Cultural Revolution, when "red" (poor) family background became essential for
everything from college admission to government service, Zhou had to go back to his
 mother's mother whom he claimed was a farmer's daughter, to find a family member who
qualified as "red".[6]
2. This is the reason for the adoption given in Gao (23). Lee (11) suggests that it was due to the
belief that having a son could cure a father's illness.
3. Zhou's father may have also been in Manchuria at this time, and Zhou may have lived with
him for a while. Afterwards Zhou's contacts with his father diminished. He died in 1941. See
Lee 19–21 for a discussion of Zhou's relationship with his father.
4. The date of this has been controversial. Most writers, such as Gao (41), now accept March
1921. Several of these cells were established in late 1920 and early 1921. The cells were
organized before the Chinese Communist Party was established in July 1921, so there is
some controversy over the membership status of cell members.
5. In addition to noting the uncertain status of cell members versus party members, Levine (151
n47) questions whether Zhou was at this point a "stalwart" Communist in his beliefs.
6. This description is based on Lee 161. Other sources give varying dates, places and
numbers of people.
7. Lee cites Zhou's last public activity in Europe as a Nationalist Party farewell dinner on 24
July.
8. The conflicting evidence on Zhou's positions at Whampoa is summarized in Wilbur,
Missionaries 196 n7. Another point of confusion is that Chou was later head of the Political
Training Department. This was technically not part of Whampoa, but was a unit of the central
government, responsible directly to the National Government Military Council.[50]
9. "Secretary of provincial committee" is according to Barnouin and Yu, 32. Other works give
different dates and positions. His work in the Provincial Military Section probably came a
little later, see Barnouin and Yu 35.
10. As Wilbur notes, Russian advisors played important roles in these early campaigns.

References

Citations
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89.html). People.com.cn (Renminwang) (in Chinese (China)).
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External links
Zhou Enlai (https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0159288/) at IMDb
Works by or about Zhou Enlai (https://worldcat.org/identities/lccn-n50-42000) in libraries
(WorldCat catalog)
Zhou Enlai Biography (http://www.spartacus-educational.com/COLDenlai.htm) From
Spartacus Educational
Zhou Enlai, Stephan Landserger's Chinese Propaganda Pages [1] (http://www.iisg.nl/landsb
erger/zel.html)
The Mystery of Zhou Enlai (http://www.nybooks.com/articles/22698) by Jonathan Spence
from The New York Review of Books
The short film Interview with Zhou En Lai (1965) (https://archive.org/details/gov.archives.arc.
655146) is available for free download at the Internet Archive.
S. L. James. "China: Communist History Through Film" (https://archive.org/details/china-com
munist-history). Internet Archive. Retrieved 28 July 2015.

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