In 1965, why did ** announce the abolition of the military rank system that had been in place for 10 years, and it was not restored until 1988?
On May 22 of this year, at the ninth meeting of the Third Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, the deputies discussed whether to abolish the military rank system according to the suggestions of *** and others, and finally unanimously decided to cancel the 55-style military rank, and replaced the military uniforms of the People's Liberation Army during the implementation of the military rank system.
In the decades that followed, the uniforms worn by the officers and men of the three armies were all "one red star and two red flags", and they could only distinguish between cadres and soldiers from the pockets of their jackets, of which cadres had four pockets and soldiers had only two pockets.
So, what exactly went wrong at that time that made *** cancel the military rank system?
Military rank is very important to the army, long before the founding of New China, the establishment of a military rank system was considered, but it was not implemented in the war environment at that time, and the troops were scattered in various places to fight for many reasons; Therefore, in September 1950, when New China had just been founded, the General Cadre Management Department specially organized personnel and set up a department called the "Military Rank Reward Department" to begin to study the issue of the military rank system.
Soon after, China sent volunteers into Korea to participate in the war, and the commander of the volunteers deeply felt the inconvenience caused by the lack of military ranks in our army. At that time, both the Korean People's Army and the U.S. Army had military ranks, so when negotiating, there would be an issue of identity reciprocity; In desperation, Zhi Si could only temporarily add some military ranks to the comrades participating in the negotiations, such as Deng Hua, deputy commander of the Volunteer Army, who was collectively called General Deng Hua.
On the National Day in 1951, ** wrote to ** in the "Seven Suggestions for Preparing for War", one of which was to establish a military rank system; Later, during his tenure as Minister of Defense, he also injected a lot of effort into this work.
Because the total number of PLA at that time was several million, and there was no experience in establishing a military rank system, it also needed the help of Soviet advisers. Finally, according to the experience of the Soviet army and the situation in China, the General Cadre Department formulated a military rank system of 6 grades and 19 grades, including 2 levels of marshal, 4 levels of generals, 4 levels of colonel, 4 levels of lieutenants, 3 levels of non-commissioned officers, and 2 levels of soldiers.
In September 1955, the People's Liberation Army finally began to implement the rank system, but due to our lack of experience and the fact that it was established in the context of a comprehensive study of the Soviet Union, many problems were not taken into account, so after a period of implementation, all kinds of problems were exposed.
For example, the rank system is not well designed, and many officers are actually lower in rank than they are in position.
According to the system at that time, the army commander was to be awarded lieutenant general, and the division commander was awarded major general, but the Soviet advisers thought that it should be lowered. Although many people thought it was unreasonable, in order to respect the opinions of the Soviet advisers, when the actual title was finally awarded, the military ranks were lowered by one or two levels, most of the army commanders were awarded major generals, and a few with a little less seniority were awarded colonels, while the division commanders were basically colonels.
In addition to the low ranks, too much emphasis is placed on the ranks of the chief officers at all levels, and the ranks of the deputy are equal to or even lower than the main posts at the next level.
In addition to this, the system of promotion of military ranks is also flawed. Since the first conferment of the title in 1955, the ranks of major general and above have stopped; Marshal is the highest military rank, and it is reasonable that there is no promotion, but none of the 1,050 generals who were awarded the title for the first time were promoted by the abolition of the military rank system in 1965, and only between 1960 and 1964 were 554 colonels promoted to major generals.
This problem is not only in the generals, but also in the lieutenants below. In the year when the title was awarded, many cadres were promoted quickly, but their military ranks did not keep up, and they still wore their original military ranks, which brought a lot of inconvenience to their work.
In addition, military rank does not play a big role in the treatment of soldiers. In 1955, when the rank system was introduced, the army also changed from a supply system to a salary system; But at that time, the salary was mainly based on the actual position, regardless of the military rank.
** also found that there are many imperfections in this military rank system modeled after the Soviet army, and relations with the Soviet Union have broken down at this time, so he is thinking about whether the military rank system has been abolished?
In August 1964, the marshal who presided over the work of the Military Commission, when reporting to the military commission, also mentioned the issue of abolishing the military rank system, which coincided with the idea of the military rank, so in 1965, the third people's congress passed a resolution to abolish the military rank system.
Because there were many problems with the Type 55 rank, *** advocated that it be abolished; For example, all officers and soldiers wear liberation hats, the previous large-brimmed hats, sailors' caps, women's brimmed soft hats, and the symbols of the military branches, Western-style dresses and women's skirts above the former colonel rank have been abolished, and the style of the navy's uniforms has been changed to be the same as that of the army and the air force.
For many years after that, the officers and men of the People's Liberation Army were "one red star and two red flags", and they could only distinguish between cadres and soldiers, with cadres having four pockets of their shirts and two of soldiers.
Although this embodies the unanimous tradition of our officers and soldiers, after the reform and opening up in 1978, we deeply felt that the lack of military ranks would affect the modernization of the army, especially in the counterattack against Vietnam in 1979, the PLA exposed the disadvantages of not having military ranks.
At that time, a certain unit participating in the war had to pass through a narrow road, and the soldiers did not give in to each other and were huddled together; At this time, a cadre who claimed to be the division commander stood up and wanted to organize everyone to pass, but the soldiers did not listen to him, because he had no rank, and could only judge him by the four pockets of his jacket. But from the leader of the ** Military Commission to the platoon commander, they are all the same style of tops.
After the news reached Beijing, ** deeply felt that the restoration of the military rank system was imminent, so at the enlarged meeting of the Military Commission in 1980, ** officially proposed to restore the military rank system as soon as possible.
Because Xiao Jinguang, Tan Zheng and other founding marshals or generals are still alive, the military rank office of the Military Commission also wrote the ranks of marshal and general in the original plan; However, considering that the cadres below the army level in the army at that time basically grew up in peacetime, and their military merits naturally could not be compared with the generals in the war years, so he made a final decision: the military rank and grade in peacetime should be set simply, and the highest level should be set to the general.
At the suggestion of ***, the Military Rank Office adjusted the rank of the 55-style officer, canceled the ranks of marshal, general and captain, and changed it to 3 grades and 11 grades, that is, the fourth rank of officer, the fourth rank of school officer, and the first rank of lieutenant.
Later, in 1994, the military ranks of officers were revised, clearly stipulating that the chairman of the Military Commission will not confer military ranks, and the military rank of vice chairman and member of the Military Commission will be general.
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