Deng Xiaoping's Administration of Southwest China Attaches Importance to Secrecy Work

In July 1950, Deng Xiaoping delivered a speech at the first plenary meeting of the Southwest Military and Political Commission

In the early days of the founding of New China, Deng Xiaoping, who led his troops into the southwest, was appointed first secretary of the Southwest Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, vice chairman of the Southwest military and political Commission, and political commissar of the Southwest military region. With the liberation of the southwest region, it is imperative to establish and consolidate the people's democratic regime, restore and develop the social economy. During this period, in view of the severe situation faced by the southwest region at that time, especially the deliberate sabotage and theft of state secrets by enemy agents, Deng Xiaoping was highly vigilant and attached great importance to it, and adopted a series of secrecy measures, including carrying out secrecy education, strengthening secrecy management, and strictly grasping secrecy inspection, so as to ensure the security of state secrets.
 

"Today's environment is more complex than in the past." "Our cadres must be vigilant"

When New China was founded in 1949, the southwest region had not yet been liberated. With the defeat of the Kuomintang group, the enemy situation in this region was extremely complicated and severe.
In the later period of the War of Liberation, Chiang Kai-shek was unwilling to fail in the face of the successive victories of the People's Liberation Army. He wanted to use the southwest region as his base for "anti-communist revival". He not only gathered hundreds of thousands of troops here, but also expanded many local security organizations. At the same time, a large number of spies have been systematically trained to lurk around the southwest. According to relevant statistics, at that time, in Kunming, Yunnan, there were 26 secret service organizations affiliated to the Kuomintang Secret Service Bureau, the Central United, and the second Department of the Ministry of National Defense, with 2137 secret agents. Mao Renfeng, the leader of the Kuomintang secret service, personally arranged a "contingency plan" to arrange for the secret service to lurk. In Guiyang, Guizhou, there are more than 1400 KMT spies, who are waiting for an opportunity to sabotage. In Chengdu, Sichuan, the Kuomintang secret service organs once held five "training courses for guerrilla cadres", training more than 3000 key secret service personnel for latent and "guerrilla" activities ". In addition, as the pace of the War of Liberation accelerated, a large number of special agents from the Central Plains District, Central China District, and the Second Division of the Xi'an Appeasement Agency of the Second Department of the Kuomintang Ministry of National Defense rushed to Chengdu, and "placed nearly 80000 professional agents" in various parts of Sichuan ".
In the early days of liberation, these spies had frequent activities, or organized reactionary armed forces, and colluded with bandits, bullies, gang leaders, reactionary members, etc., to create riots; or they lurked in major cities, waiting for opportunities to rob, assassinate, and steal materials, etc., and rampant destruction. In particular, after the outbreak of the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, they "gathered bullies, landlords, reactionary members and gang hooligans, etc., and adopted the method of scattered, concealed and small-scale activities" to launch an attack on the new-born people's regime. In the meantime, they "scattered and concealed to cities and towns to carry out sabotage activities, arson, poisoning, and stealing secrets", all kinds of evil deeds, seriously disrupting social order.
The sabotage activities of secret agents, especially the theft of state secrets, aroused Deng Xiaoping's high vigilance and attention. On January 4, 1950, he pointed out in his speech at the first meeting of cadres in charge of the Chongqing Military Management Committee: "This time we marched into the southwest, we wiped out the 600000 of the enemy, but there were not many prisoners among them, and most of them were uprising. Is this good? Good... But comrades should understand that the biggest and hardest struggle is still to come." "In the southwest, on the one hand, the spies used the 'uprising 'flag as a cover, and on the other hand, they made long-term plans to lurk. The spies are scattered and hidden in many corners, and will even drill into our camp to engage in sabotage activities, and our cadres must be vigilant."
On June 3, 1950, when Deng Xiaoping wrote an inscription for the Southwest Public Security Newsletter of the Southwest Ministry of Public Security: "Strengthening the covert struggle and eliminating bandits is a long-term and arduous task in the future ......" On July 14, when he wrote the inscription for the inaugural issue of "confidential work" compiled and printed by the confidential office of the Southwest Military Command, he further emphasized that "today's environment is more complex than in the past, protecting our secrets is more important than ever. The victory of the revolution is prone to paralysis and negligence, which will give the enemy an opportunity to take advantage of. Therefore, all responsible comrades and confidential cadres should be vigilant."
　　

　　Stressing the need to "attach importance to keeping state secrets" and strengthen secrecy education

In October 1950, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China issued the Decision on Strengthening the Secrets of the Conservative Party and the State. This document makes an in-depth analysis of the new situation faced by the party and the state in secrecy work after the victory of the revolution, and requires party committees at all levels to strengthen their own secrecy construction, especially to make provisions on the secrecy of meetings, the secrecy of documents, and the management of confidential personnel. at the same time, it is proposed to clean up the secret agents lurking in the party and state organs.
In order to implement the decision of the Central Committee, Deng Xiaoping made an important speech on "attaching importance to the preservation of state secrets" at the 10th collective office meeting of the Southwest military and political Commission on October 18.
At the meeting, Deng Xiaoping stressed the need to strengthen the concept of enemy situation. At the beginning, he pointed out: "according to the latest materials, every measure determined by our government can easily be taken by imperialism and Kuomintang reactionaries. There are many measures, including those of the central and local governments. We have not yet taken them out. The enemy has already arranged them in advance and the slogans of incitement have come out. For example, on the price issue, as soon as we arranged it, the inciting slogan came out at once." He also pointed out: "Regardless of the parties, government departments, mass organizations, it has a certain degree of secrecy ...... There are some things that we consider irrelevant, but are useful when known by the enemy. For example, our financial figures, industrial construction plans, etc., are known by the enemy, so that we can estimate our strength, understand our priorities, and thus carry out destruction." Therefore, everyone must be more vigilant.
Deng Xiaoping stressed the need to strengthen secrecy education, especially on the issue of leaks, saying: "Strictly speaking, leaking secrets, whether consciously or unconsciously, is tantamount to treason. Because we have no habit of secrecy, we need to educate. In the past, in the liberated areas, foreigners and imperialist spies were not easy to enter, and as a result, some comrades had poor secrecy habits, so we need to educate now." On the issue of how to carry out secrecy education, he emphatically pointed out: "In the past, the central government issued an instruction to keep state secrets. All government departments, all parties, military and civilians must conduct education. The heads of all departments should pay special attention to this issue." He placed particular emphasis on raising awareness of secrecy at all levels through secrecy education.
Deng Xiaoping also attached great importance to the management of classified personnel. In his speech, he pointed out: "Premier Zhou said in particular that departments should always remind staff to pay attention, for example, every message should have a scope, so that after the news leaks, we should go to the people in this scope... So we should work out a set of methods, including personnel issues, departments for staff to review frequently, which people are guaranteed, which people are worth noting." It can be seen that he is also very strict with the management requirements of confidential personnel, including regular confidential review and screening.
Also at this meeting, Deng Xiaoping advocated that the leading organs should take the lead in doing a good job of secrecy, and demanded that "the secrecy work of the organs should start with the military and political Committee." it was also made clear that Sun Zhiyuan (then secretary-general of the Southwest military and political Commission) and Xingya and Xiong Zijun (both of whom were deputy secretaries-general of the Southwest military and political Commission at that time) studied a specific method and implemented it in various departments.
 　

　Carry out inspection and rectification of secrecy work, rectify and improve the organization of the secrecy committee

In accordance with the requirements of Deng Xiaoping's speech, Yunnan, Guizhou, Eastern Sichuan, Xikang and other provinces and regions took immediate action under the leadership of the Southwest Bureau of the CPC Central Committee. They dug up and investigated and dealt with a number of Kuomintang spies and counter-revolutionaries who were lurking in our party and government organs, and tried and published a number of cases in which spies had "stolen secrets, stamped official seals and seals of the head of the party and government organs, and made false documents, resulting in huge losses.
After the inspection and rectification of confidentiality work, the Southwest Bureau discovered and solved many hidden problems, and formulated targeted rectification measures. On November 3, 1950, Deng Xiaoping and others wrote in a report to Mao Zedong, the Central Military Commission and the military regions: "Through inspection, it is found that there are still serious problems in the work of keeping state secrets in the southwest region. There have been major leaks of state secrets. The main reason for this is the serious existence of the concept of peace and negligence and paralysis among leading cadres and staff at all levels. Moreover, the strict internal examination is not enough, and bandits sneak in and steal and destroy. What is more serious is that some cadres despise secrets and turn a blind eye to leaks, believing that there is no secret to protect." The report also proposes specific measures to quickly correct serious leaks, including: "1. Continue to conduct in-depth confidentiality inspections and give necessary sanctions to those who leak secrets; 2. Rectify and improve the organization of confidentiality committees at all levels; 3. Strengthen the management of confidential documents and telecommunications, and formulate a strict confidentiality system; 4. Generally conduct anti-spy confidentiality education to overcome negligence and paralysis."
Mao Zedong, Liu Shaoqi and other central leaders fully affirmed this report, and issued the ''Notice of the Central Committee Forwarding the Southwest Bureau's Report on Confidentiality Work'' on November 16, requiring all central bureaus, sub-bureaus, and military region party committees to carefully refer to the Southwest Bureau. Practice, do a good job of confidentiality.
In order to consolidate and deepen the achievements of the rectification of secrecy work, Deng Xiaoping adhered to the problem orientation and resolutely pursued the victory in view of the outstanding problems and hidden dangers. On January 25, 1951, at the second plenary meeting of the Southwest Military and Political Committee, he emphasized the need to "continue to suppress counter-revolutions and keep state secrets".
Deng Xiaoping pointed out in his speech: "The enemy is unwilling to fail. After their public sabotage activities have failed, they will inevitably and have been strengthening their concealed activities, and they will inevitably adopt more tricks to carry out conspiracy and sabotage. It is necessary to heighten vigilance, strengthen public security work, strengthen the work of procuratorial organs and courts, and wage a strong struggle against secret agents and spies. In industry, mines, warehouses and all economic sectors, we must seriously guard against the destruction of counter revolution, because this is one of the main aspects of destruction carried out by secret agents and bandits." At the same time, he stressed: "We must resolutely implement the policy of doing the first evil, not asking questions about it, and receiving awards for meritorious service, and correct the wrong practice of being lenient and boundless. All state and military organs should seriously educate themselves on the preservation of state and military secrets, establish a secrecy system, and pay close attention to inspections, without any negligence."
The Southwest Bureau of the CPC Central Committee further summed up the experience and lessons of secrecy work and promulgated the regulations on secrecy work in the Southwest region on February 1, 1951, which clearly stipulates that "all organs at or above the prefectural party committee, special department, and military division (division) must set up secrecy committees" to perform the duties of secrecy work, and make specific provisions on document management and personnel management.
Through efforts, the confidentiality work of the Southwest Bureau has gradually embarked on the road of standardization and institutionalization, thus effectively preventing the occurrence of major cases of leakage of secrets by party and government organs. In this way, since the liberation of the southwest region, under the leadership of Deng Xiaoping and others, after a period of comprehensive rectification, the confidentiality work has achieved remarkable results.

(Source: Party History Expo, No. 2, 2024)