He is an important leader of China, and although historically he has been considered an opponent of the reform and opening up, in reality he is not completely opposed to reform and opening up. During his tenure as vice premier of science and technology, he said that China's scientific and technological personnel should be brave enough to read foreign books and learn from foreign advanced experiences. At the end of 1977, he also sent a delegation to visit many countries and put forward the viewpoint that "we must insist on independence and self-reliance, and at the same time learn from the advanced experience of foreign countries, because if we want to learn from foreign countries, we must go abroad to study and understand." In June 1978, after listening to the reports of Lin Hujia's visit to Japan and Duan Yun's visit to Hong Kong and Macao, he deeply felt that the thinking of Chinese cadres could not keep up with the times, so he proposed a solution: go abroad more and investigate more. He believes that China has been sitting in the well for too long and watching the sky, and the night is arrogant.
This feedback greatly stimulated *** and prompted him to decide to go abroad to have a look. So in August of the same year, he visited Romania, Yugoslavia and Iran. This arrangement was justified, Romania and Yugoslavia at that time were both countries of the socialist camp and did not have very close relations with the Soviet Union, while Iran was an important country in the "One Line" strategy. The establishment of good relations with these three countries is very beneficial to China's diplomacy. The focus of this visit was Yugoslavia, and its leader Tito attached great importance to the arrival of ***, which was welcomed by three or four hundred thousand people on the same day. Despite Tito's 86-year-old age and poor health, he had four meetings and two private meetings with ***.
He also visited many factories and gained insight into Yugoslavia's economic policy, which touched his heart greatly. According to the recollections of the accompanying personnel on this trip, ** once said with a sigh: Yugoslavia and Romania were open to foreign economic cooperation, and adopted such methods as compensation, absorption of foreign investment, cooperative operation and production cooperation, but it did not seem to have harmed national sovereignty. Yugoslav leaders also praised China's good credit, saying that they could not borrow foreign loans if they wanted to, but China did not want to borrow. ** On the same day, he said to the people around him: It seems inevitable that we will absorb foreign loans. After returning to China, Comrade Hua emphasized an important viewpoint: I agree that the secretaries of the provincial party committees should conduct more inspections, which will help emancipate the mind and discover the gaps in economic construction in a timely manner, and we must strive for time to catch up.
Subsequently, there was a wave of visits to Yugoslavia. The National Planning Conference of September of the same year determined that "three transformations" must be carried out on the economic front: first, the main focus should be shifted to the struggle for production and the technological revolution;Second, change the management system and management methods, and implement scientific management;In addition, it has changed from a closed and semi-closed state to actively introduce foreign advanced technology and boldly enter the international market. These measures show that Comrade Hua is not blindly carrying out the original policy. After the 11th Plenary Session decided on reform and opening up, China's exchanges with the outside world have increased significantly, and its exchanges with Japan have been relatively close. In May 1979, Liao Chengzhi, who was the director of the Overseas Chinese Affairs Office at that time, led a delegation to visit Japan. In December of the same year, Japanese Prime Minister Masahiro Ohira also visited China and extended an invitation to Comrade Hua to do so.
In May 1980, Comrade Hua gladly accepted the invitation and began a six-day trip to Japan. He mainly visited factories in Japan, and when he saw large machines that he had never seen before, he personally observed them and asked the workers how they operated. His approachable attitude surprised the Japanese people who traveled with him. In general, Comrade Hua's visit was pleasant and successful, although there were also some hiccups. Comrade Hua's life was very simple and easy-going, and there was even a mistake in buttoning the button when he was inspecting the grassroots level in China. It's okay at home, but abroad, he represents the image of the whole country, so special attention needs to be paid to it, but at first Comrade Hua did not realize this.
On the evening of his arrival in Japan, Comrade Hua returned to the arranged hotel after the dinner, and after washing up, he put on his pajamas and bathrobe and prepared to go out for a walk and enjoy the night. It was a habit he had been doing for many years, but on this very day, the secretary stopped him and said very nervously that he could not go out like this. Comrade Hua asked the reason, and the secretary replied: This is not in China, your status is special, there may be ** and reporters around, if you go out like this, you may appear in Japanese newspapers or TV the next day. Comrade Hua laughed and listened to the advice and returned to the room. In the next few days, every time Comrade Hua wanted to go out for a walk, he would first check whether he was dressed appropriately, and he would call his secretary for reference, and only after receiving a positive answer would he go out. As Comrade Hua was about to conclude his visit to Japan, Japan held a grand news conference.
Since China has just begun to open up, there are many questions about it. At the meeting, a reporter raised a rather sensitive question: According to information from Beijing, will you resign from the post of premier and continue to serve as chairman of the Central Military Commission?Can you confirm the news?Comrade Hua was a little angry about this kind of issue involving the country's internal affairs: "Some of you foreign ** have a common problem, that is, they like to speculate and comment on China's personnel issues indiscriminately. Therefore, I don't want to answer such questions here. Despite this, Comrade Hua remained calm in answering other non-offensive questions. On 1 June, Comrade Hua returned to China from his visit. Ten days later, Japanese Prime Minister Masahiro Ohira, who had actively promoted the normalization of diplomatic relations between China and Japan, passed away.
However, Comrade Hua once again set foot on Japanese soil and attended the funeral of Masahiro Ohira. This closeness has caused many Japanese to take a fresh look at China and has laid a solid foundation for cooperation between the two countries. Comrade Hua has had in-depth exchanges not only with many foreign leaders in Japan, but also with actions to support opening up and promote exchanges between China and the world. Although Comrade Hua was not the leader of the policy of opening up, he also made great contributions to it.