Zhou Enlai
Zhou Enlai ( March 5, 1898 – January 8, 1976), was Premier of the People's Republic of China from 1949 until his death in January 1976, and China's foreign minister from 1949 to 1958. Zhou was instrumental in the Communist Party's rise to power, and subsequently in the construction of the Chinese economy and reformation of Chinese society. On the international scene Zhou was a skilled and able diplomat, having advocated peaceful coexistence and been a participant at the Geneva Conference in 1954. As a result of his moral character, he was very popular with the Chinese public, and Zhou's death brought an outpouring of support which turned out to be crucial in China's transition of power between Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping. He is also remembered for saying, when asked for his assessment of the 1789 French Revolution, "It is too early to say".
Revolutionary activities
Zhou first came to national prominence as an activist during the May Fourth Movement. He had enrolled as a student in the literature department of Nankai University, which enabled him to visit the campus, but he never attended classes. He became one of the organizers of the Tianjin Students Union, whose avowed aim was “to struggle against the warlords and against imperialism, and to save China from extinction." Zhou became the editor of the student union’s newspaper, Tianjin Student. In September, he founded the Awareness Society with twelve men and eight women. Fifteen year old Deng Yingchao, Enlai’s future wife, was one of the founding female members. (They were not married until much later, on August 8, 1925). Zhou was instrumental in the merger between the all male Tianjin Students Union and the all female Women’s Patriotic Association.
Though debunking of Chinese leaders has become more common in recent years, Zhou has not shared in the personal and political charges leveled at Mao. The recent biography by Gao Wenqian raises questions, however. As a staffer at closed party archives, Gao had access to internal files, interviews, memos, and compilations. He smuggled out notes and documents with which to write an explosive Chinese language biography, published in Hong Kong in 1999, full of backstage explanations of major events. Although not as prurient as recent inside biographies of Mao, Gao's portrait implies that during the Cultural Revolution, Zhou gave in to Mao's whims rather than consistently mitigating them, and that he did not protect all of those he could have.