Chu Teh

Chu Teh: see Zhu De.

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Zhu De

 or Chu Teh

(born Dec. 1, 1886, Yilong, Sichuan province, China—died July 6, 1976, Beijing) Founder of the Chinese communist force that became the People's Liberation Army. Educated at Yunnan Military Academy, Zhu began his military career in the armies of warlords in southern China. He became a communist in the early 1920s but hid his affiliation to become an officer in the Nationalist army. In 1927 he took part in the communist-led Nanchang Uprising, an event celebrated annually in China as the birth of the People's Liberation Army. When the uprising was defeated, Zhu led his troops south to join Mao Zedong's small guerrilla forces. He became commander in chief of the communist forces, a position he held through World War II and the civil war with the Nationalists, not stepping down until 1954. With Mao, Zhu is credited with elevating guerrilla warfare to a major strategic concept.

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Chu Teh, Zhu De

1886--1976, Chinese military leader and politician; he became commander in chief of the Red Army (1931) and was chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress of the People's Republic of China (1959--76)

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Chu Teh 

Born Nov. 6, 1886, in Hung District, Szechwan Province; died July 6, 1976, in Peking. Chinese military, state, and political figure.

Chu Teh graduated from a military school in the city of K’un-ming. He joined the revolutionary organization T’ung-meng Hui in 1909 and subsequently took part in the Hsinhai Revolution of 1911–13. From 1922 to 1925 he studied in Germany, where he joined the Communist Party of China (CPC) in 1922. In 1925 and 1926 he was in the USSR. He was an organizer and leader of the Nanch’ang Uprising of 1927.

Chu Teh became a candidate member of the Central Committee of the CPC in 1930, commander of the Chinese Red Army in 1931, and a member of the Central Committee and the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPC in 1934. From 1934 to 1936 he was a leader of the Long March, and in 1937 he was appointed commander of the Eighth Army. Chu Teh served as a secretary of the Central Committee of the CPC from 1945 to 1956 and commander of the People’s Liberation Army of China from 1945 to 1954.

Chu Teh was vice-chairman of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) from 1949 to 1954. From 1955 to 1965, when military ranks were abolished in the PRC, he held the title of marshal of the PRC. From 1956 to 1969 he was a member of the Standing Committee of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPC; he again became a member in 1973. In 1959 he was named chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress of the PRC. During the Cultural Revolution Chu Teh came under attack by the Red Guards.

V. I. ELIZAROV