Chen Entian, Chairman of the World Peace Ribbon Organization, let slip a remark during a recent media interview. According to Chen Entian, during the Great Revolution, among the early leaders of CPC, the leader of KMT Chiang Kai-shek, feared most was Chen Entian's great-uncle, Chen Yannian. This is evident from the prices on Chiang Kai-shek's wanted posters: Chen Duxiu was priced at 30,000 silver dollars, Zhou Enlai at 25,000, while Chen Yanian commanded a staggering 40,000. What momentous deeds did Chen Yanian accomplish to strike such fear into Chiang Kai-shek? Chiang remarked that Chen Yanian's threat surpassed that of his father a hundredfold, and Zhou Enlai called him "Little Lenin." As the great-grandson of Chen Duxiu and a researcher of CPC history, Chen Entian has provided an article about Chen Yanian, the top leader of the CPC in southern China during the Great Revolution, leading the Guangdong Regional Committee in forming the Independent Regiment. After reading it, one finally understands: had Chen Yanian not sacrificed himself, the CPC's military-building practice of forming Independent Regiments would have been rapidly replicated.
In November 1924, the CPC Central Committee appointed Chen Yanian as Secretary-General and Head of the Organization Department of the Guangdong Regional Committee, preparing him to succeed Zhou Enlai as the leader of the CPC Guangdong Regional Committee. It also appointed Zhou Enlai as Head of the Military Department of the CPC Guangdong Regional Committee and concurrently Director of the Political Department of the Whampoa Military Academy. After Chen Yanian and Zhou Enlai obtained Sun Yat-sen's consent, they decided to form the "Armored Motorcade of the Grand Marshal's Mansion for the Army and Navy." The CPC Guangdong Regional Committee transferred Xu Chengzhang from the Whampoa Military Academy to serve as captain of the Motorcade, Liao Qianwu as political commissar, Zhou Shidi as deputy captain, and Cao Ruqian as political instructor. This was the prototype of the CPC's first regular armed force. In February 1925, the CPC Central Committee formally appointed Chen Yanian to succeed Zhou Enlai as Secretary of the Guangdong Regional Committee, presiding over its overall work. Zhou Enlai retained his positions as member of the Standing Committee of the CPC Guangdong Regional Committee, Head of the Military Department, and Director of the Political Department of the Whampoa Military Academy. From then on, Chen Yanian and Zhou Enlai launched the CPC's military-building practice. The Armored Motorcade was nominally under the jurisdiction of the Grand Marshal's Mansion but was actually directly controlled by the CPC Guangdong Regional Committee. Never having joined the Kuomintang nor held any concurrent post within it, Chen Yanian, as the top leader of the CPC in southern China, devoted himself wholly to the Party's organizational development and military-building practice. He established a Party branch within the Armored Motorcade, trained large numbers of military cadres, and pioneered the principle of "the Party commands the gun" for the CPC. Following the First Eastern Expedition of the National Revolutionary Army, Chen Yanian and Zhou Enlai decided to expand the Armored Motorcade into the Independent Regiment of the Fourth Army of the National Revolutionary Army, carefully selecting a large contingent of Communists and Communist Youth League members with high political consciousness and military caliber as military cadres. For instance, Mo Qibiao, Communist Party member and platoon leader of the first platoon of the Armored Motorcade, became commander of the first company of the Independent Regiment; Li Haitao, Communist Party member and second platoon leader, became commander of the eighth company; Gao Chao, Communist Party member and third platoon leader, became commander of the third company; Zhou Zikun served as platoon leader of a certain fourth-company platoon, Lai Yuanliang as commander of the reconnaissance team, Fu Kezhen as deputy commander of the first battalion, Cao Yuan as commander of the first battalion, Xu Jishan as commander of the second battalion, Hu Huanwen as commander of the ninth company, and Lin Biao as probationary platoon leader.
In September 1925, Ye Ting returned to Guangzhou from Moscow and reported for duty to Chen Yanian, Secretary of the CPC Guangdong Regional Committee. The CPC Guangdong Regional Committee appointed Ye Ting as commander of the Independent Regiment of the Fourth Army of the National Revolutionary Army. To ensure the absolute leadership of the CPC Guangdong Regional Committee over the Independent Regiment, Chen Yanian and Zhou Enlai established within it a Party Branch Executive Council and a Communist Youth League Branch. The Party Branch Executive Council was composed of Ye Ting, Zhou Shidi, Dong Lang, and Wu Jiyan. Wu Jiyan served as Secretary of the Party Branch, with Ye Ting and Dong Lang as organization directors and Zhou Shidi as propaganda director. Six sub-groups were set up under the Party Branch—one at the regimental headquarters, one in each of the three battalions, and two among the directly subordinate units. Secretary of the Regional Committee Chen Yanian also dispatched Organization Department Head Mu Qing to regularly inspect the Party's work in the Independent Regiment, reporting promptly to the CPC Guangdong Regional Committee while conveying the Committee's directives to the Regiment. Commander Ye Ting, Party Branch Secretary Wu Jiyan, First Battalion Commander Zhou Shidi (later Chief of Staff), and Staff Officer Dong Zhongming frequently reported their work to Secretary Chen Yanian; all cadres above company level in the Independent Regiment were appointed by the CPC Guangdong Regional Committee. The Party Branch Executive Council operated on the principle of democratic centralism—major issues concerning the Independent Regiment had to be discussed and submitted to the CPC Guangdong Regional Committee for approval. This organizational practice of "the Party commanding the gun" laid a solid foundation for the CPC's subsequent command of the army.
In late April 1926, the Independent Regiment set out as the vanguard of the Northern Expedition. The CPC Guangdong Regional Committee issued six directives to the Regiment: first, strengthen Party leadership and political work; second, pay attention to mobilizing and organizing the masses; third, attend to united front work and solidarity with friendly forces; fourth, fight bravely with a spirit of sacrifice and the ability to endure hardship; fifth, play a pioneering, exemplary, and backbone role; sixth, though other armies may be unwilling to serve as the vanguard, once you win battles, they will follow. As the vanguard of the Northern Expeditionary Army, the Independent Regiment swept across the battlefield, assaulting fortified positions and overcoming every difficulty like splitting bamboo. It swiftly routed the main forces of the warlord Wu Peifu of the Zhili clique, winning a resounding victory in its first battle at Lütian, Youxian County, and occupied Hunan and Hubei, rendering outstanding service to the triumph of the Northern Expedition and earning the Fourth Army of the National Revolutionary Army the illustrious title of "Iron Army."
Many of the CPC's later uprisings were participated in by several units expanded from the Independent Regiment as their backbone, which thus became an important source of the Party's army. After the Nanchang Uprising, the 25th Division, led by Zhu De and Chen Yi, moved to southern Hunan, launched the Southern Hunan Uprising, and formed the First Division of the Workers' and Peasants' Revolutionary Army. In April 1928, Zhu De led his forces to the Jinggang Mountains, where they joined forces with the Autumn Harvest Uprising troops led by Mao Zedong—whose main component was the Lu Deming Guards Regiment formed from part of the backbone of the Independent Regiment—and founded the Fourth Army of the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Revolutionary Army. Thus, the forces built around the Independent Regiment as their backbone developed into the Red Fourth Army led by Mao Zedong and Zhu De, and later evolved into the Red First Corps. During the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, the Red First Corps further grew into a major component of the Eighth Route Army's 115th Division (with Lin Biao as commander), the Jin-Cha-Ji Military Region forces, the Shandong Military Region forces, and the Third Division of the New Fourth Army (with Huang Kecheng as commander). During the War of Liberation, it evolved into a key component of the Third Field Army, the Fourth Field Army, and the field armies of the North China Military Region.
In March 1927, Chen Yanian left Guangzhou for Wuhan to attend the Fifth National Congress of the CPC. As the revolutionary situation in Jiangsu and Zhejiang—including Shanghai—suddenly turned dire, requiring a leader of Chen Yanian's caliber, the Central Committee appointed him to succeed as Secretary of the CPC Jiangsu-Zhejiang Regional Committee. Chen Yanian immediately turned toward Shanghai, when the "April 12" counter-revolutionary coup erupted en route. In Shanghai, shrouded by White Terror, Chen Yanian, heedless of danger, deployed work, sought out scattered comrades, restored and rebuilt Party organizations, and actively carried out the struggle. On June 26, Chen Yanian was arrested by the Kuomintang. To extract the secrets of the CPC organization, the enemy inflicted upon him every manner of torture, leaving his body mutilated, in an attempt to force him to reveal the Party's Shanghai organization. But with iron-clad will, Chen Yanian strictly guarded the Party's secrets and would rather die than yield. On the evening of July 4, 1927, Chen Yanian made his heroic sacrifice.
Though Chen Yanian sacrificed his life, his leadership of the CPC Guangdong Regional Committee in military practice during the Great Revolution cultivated a vast pool of military talent for the People's Army. Chen Yanian, Zhou Enlai, and Ye Ting were not only pioneers of the CPC's armed struggle practice but also important founding figures of the Party's army. They wrote a glorious page in the history of the CPC's military development and made indelible contributions to the CPC's independent leadership of armed struggle and its victory in the democratic revolution.
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