Nie Rongzhen

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Nie Rongzhen (simplified Chinese: 聂荣臻; traditional Chinese: 聶榮臻; pinyin: Niè Róngzhēn; Wade-Giles: Nieh Jung-chen) (December 29, 1899 - May 14, 1992) was a Chinese Communist military leader.

[edit] Biography

Nie was born in Jiangjin county in Sichuan, near Chongqing, the cosmopolitan and well-educated son of a wealthy family. In 1920 Nie joined the group of Chinese students in France on a work-study program, where he studied engineering and became a protégé of Zhou Enlai. Zhou recruited him in 1921 when Nie was performing technical-scientific studies in Belgium, and he joined the Communist Party in 1923. A graduate of the Soviet Red Army Military College and Whampoa Academy, Nie spent his early career first as a political officer in Whampoa's Political Department, where Zhou served as the Deputy Director, and in the Chinese Red Army. During the Second Sino-Japanese War, he was first assigned as the deputy division commander of the 115th division of the Eighth Route Army, with the commander being Lin Biao, and in the late 1930s he was given a field command close to Yan Xishan's Shanxi stronghold. In the Chinese Civil War he commanded the Northern China Military Region, and with his deputy Xu Xiangqian, his force defeated Fu Zuoyi's forces in Tianjin near Beijing. During the Korean War, Nie took part in high command decision making, military operations planning, and shared responsibility for war mobilization. Nie was made a Marshal of the PLA in 1955 and later ran the Chinese nuclear weapons program. He was purged during the Cultural Revolution.

[edit] See also

List of officers of the People's Liberation Army

[edit] References

Preceded by Ye Jianying	Mayor of Beijing 1949 – 1951	Succeeded by Peng Zhen
Preceded by Xu Xiangqian	Head of PLA General Staff Headquarters 1950–1954	Succeeded by Su Yu
Preceded by none	Director of State Science and Technology Commission 1958 – 1970	Succeeded by Fang Yi