Late in the night of April 28, 1967, Kang Sheng, an advisor to the Central Cultural Revolution Small Group, personally called Zou Dapeng, the Deputy Minister of the Central Investigation Department, to inquire about his historical issues and his relationship with the “Northeast Gang counterrevolutionary traitor group” for more than an hour. After taking this call, Zou Dapeng and his wife committed suicide.
In February 1979, the CCP Central Committee exonerated Zou Dapeng, recognizing that he not only had no problems in history but also was a hero in “Liberating the Northeast.” The so-called “Northeast Gang counterrevolutionary traitor group” fabricated by Kang Sheng simply did not exist.
During the ten years of the Cultural Revolution, the Central Investigation Department suffered a significant blow. Minister Kong Yuan was brought down, other deputy ministers were marginalized, and Deputy Minister Zou Dapeng was designated by Premier Zhou Enlai to lead the department’s business unit, resulting in the deaths of him and his wife. Zou Dapeng’s wrongful case was considered the most tragic injustice in the history of the Central Investigation Department.
So, how did Zou Dapeng become a scapegoat in Kang Sheng’s eyes? There may be three main reasons for this:
The predecessor of the Central Investigation Department was the Central Social Department, established in October 1939, mainly responsible for the CCP’s intelligence and counterintelligence work, with Kang Sheng as its first minister.
One of the most significant actions Kang Sheng took as the Minister of the Central Social Department was during Mao Zedong’s Yan’an Rectification Movement, where he was responsible for purging officials and arresting spies.
This was the first time in Kang Sheng’s life that he mass purged within the party with Mao’s support. Throughout this process, Kang Sheng continuously gave orders, arresting one today and another tomorrow, using coercive interrogation methods to create numerous false cases, harming many people, some driven to suicide, some to self-harm, and some even ordered shot by Kang Sheng. At the time, Kang Sheng arrested 15,000 spies, but ultimately, not a single one turned out to be genuine.
Kang Sheng’s ultra-leftist methods caused discontent among many. After the 7th National Congress of the CCP in 1945, Kang Sheng began to lose power. In 1946, Kang Sheng was transferred from the Central Social Department. This was not his wish and he was very unwilling.
After the CCP came to power in 1949, the Central Social Department was dissolved, and its functions were dispersed to other departments. Through several changes, by 1955, the Central Investigation Department was established, with Li Kenong as the first minister and Kong Yuan as the second minister. Zou Dapeng served as the deputy minister and executive deputy minister.
When Kang Sheng was the Minister of the Central Social Department, Li Kenong and Kong Yuan, who were deputy ministers, had no favorable opinion of Kang Sheng. After the establishment of the Central Investigation Department, Kang Sheng was eager to get involved, but Li Kenong and Kong Yuan opposed it.
In response, Kang Sheng once complained, “My relationship with the Central Investigation Department is merely a ‘courteous exchange of official letters.'”
In May 1966, the Cultural Revolution erupted, and Kang Sheng became an advisor to the “Central Cultural Revolution Small Group,” becoming the most important political enforcer during Mao Zedong’s Cultural Revolution era.
Soon after assuming office, Kang Sheng incited the rebels to overthrow Minister Kong Yuan of the Central Investigation Department. Subsequently, he turned his sights on Executive Deputy Minister Zou Dapeng.
According to Yan Mingfu, who served as Mao Zedong’s Russian translator, “Kang Sheng had a narrow mind and was suspicious by nature. He was always afraid that those who knew his secrets would one day report him to Chairman Mao, exposing his misdeeds. So, once he held great power, he ruthlessly dealt with those who knew about him or worked under his leadership.”
Zou Dapeng had collaborated with Kong Yuan in the Central Social Department and later in the Central Investigation Department. When Li Kenong served as the Minister of the Central Social Department, Kong Yuan served as the executive deputy minister, and Zou Dapeng as the secretary general. The three worked together very well. When Kong Yuan became the Minister of the Central Investigation Department, Zou Dapeng served as the executive deputy minister.
Having studied in the Soviet Union, Kong Yuan was well aware of Kang Sheng’s background.
In the 1930s, when Wang Ming gained support from the Communist International and became the actual leader of the CCP, Kang Sheng greatly praised Wang Ming and became his deputy and enforcer.
In January 1935, during the “Long March,” the CCP held the Zunyi Conference, ending Wang Ming’s leadership. At that time, both Wang Ming and Kang Sheng were in the Soviet Union, with Wang Ming serving as the head of the CCP delegation to the Communist International, and Kang Sheng as the deputy head. Despite being favored by the Communist International and Soviet leaders, Kang Sheng did not support Wang Ming when he learned about the Zunyi Conference. Instead, he disregarded and opposed it, using his authority to block news of the meeting among CCP members in the Soviet Union. Kang Sheng also colluded with some Chinese students studying at Lenin Academy and the Moscow Oriental Labor University to jointly write to the Communist International, demanding Wang Ming’s appointment as the General Secretary of the CCP.
In late November 1937, Wang Ming and Kang Sheng returned to Yan’an. Shortly after, Wang Ming fell out of favor in the power struggle with Mao Zedong, and Kang Sheng immediately sided with Mao, becoming the first to criticize Wang Ming and gaining Mao’s trust.
In 1939, after Kong Yuan returned to Yan’an and reported Kang Sheng’s flattery and allegiance to Wang Ming in the Soviet Union to Mao Zedong, it became one of the critical reasons for moving Kang Sheng away from the Central Social Department and Yan’an. From that moment on, Kang Sheng and Kong Yuan formed a grudge against each other.
Kong Yuan definitely discussed Kang Sheng’s relationship with Wang Ming with Zou Dapeng.
Additionally, in the 1930s, when Zou Dapeng was conducting underground work in the Northeast, he also knew about the joint instructions from Moscow by Wang Ming and Kang Sheng to the underground party in Northeast China known as the “Wang-Kang instructions.”
At that time, during the peak of the anti-Japanese resistance in the Northeast, the “Wang-Kang instructions” instructed the Northeast anti-Japanese forces to “not explicitly oppose Japan and the Manchurians, wait for significant changes.” This directive was considered one of the key reasons for the failures of the Northeast anti-Japanese forces.
After the establishment of the CCP’s regime, the “Wang-Kang instructions” became a thorn in Kang Sheng’s side. He always feared that someone would use this issue to cause him trouble and affect his political future. Hence, anyone with knowledge of the “Wang-Kang instructions” or related information was seen as a potential threat by Kang Sheng.
After Minister Kong Yuan of the Central Investigation Department was overthrown, considering Zou Dapeng’s close relationship with Kong Yuan and his knowledge of the “Wang-Kang instructions,” Kang Sheng immediately turned his targeting towards Zou Dapeng.
In October 1944, the Central Social Department decided to send Zou Dapeng, then the Deputy Minister of the Central Social Department in Jin Sui, to Jiaodong as the Liaison Minister for the District Party Committee, with the mission of developing intelligence work in the Northeast.
On August 26, 1945, the “Temporary Northeast Work Committee,” led by Zou Dapeng, with over 100 intelligence personnel, urban construction officials, and armed personnel, carrying a radio transmitter, crossed the sea to Zhuanghe County, Liaodong Province, and made contact with the Soviet Red Army, reporting collected intelligence to Yan’an.
Based on Zou Dapeng’s and other sources’ feedback on the situation in the Northeast and the national situation, the CCP Central Committee formulated the strategic policy of “expanding to the north, defending in the south.”
In September 1945, the CCP Central Northeast Bureau Social Department was established, with Zou Dapeng appointed as the second minister in charge of intelligence work.
By the end of 1947, the civil war between the CCP and the Kuomintang reached a decisive stage. Under Zou Dapeng’s leadership, the Northeast Bureau Social Department infiltrated various levels of the Nationalist Party’s party, government, and military organs. By 1948, they had established a secret intelligence network covering the entire Northeast region. Zou Dapeng’s subordinates collected extensive intelligence on the national army’s situation and movements, creating favorable conditions for the CCP to gain the initiative on the battlefield.
After the Battle of Jinzhou, the situation in the Northeast rapidly deteriorated. The CCP decided to “peacefully occupy” Shenyang, primarily entrusting this task to Zou Dapeng’s leadership in the Northeast Bureau Social Department.
Zou Dapeng utilized his various old relationships in the Northeast to persuade Nationalist forces in Shenyang to support the CCP. Eventually, these senior Nationalist officers planned to overthrow the Nationalist commander of Northeast suppression, Wei Lihuang, during an emergency military-political conference, forcing Wei to announce the uprising of all defending forces.
Upon hearing this news, Shenyang Mayor Dong Wenqi discreetly informed Wei Lihuang. Seeing the inevitable outcome, Wei and Dong immediately fled to the airport, boarding the last plane to escape. On October 31, 1948, the CCP army peacefully occupied Shenyang.
Following the victory in the decisive battle in the Northeast, Lin Biao, the top leader of the CCP Northeast Bureau, sent a special message to Li Kenong, the Minister of the Central Social Department, expressing heartfelt thanks for Zou Dapeng’s timely and effective intelligence and subversive work in the Northeast.
Before the CCP seized power, there was a famous 16-character policy regarding Communist underground party members hidden in Kuomintang-controlled areas: “Conceal, accumulate, wait for the right time.” However, after the CCP took over the Nationalist capital of Nanjing, a new 16-character policy was introduced for the underground party members: “Demotion, control, local assimilation, gradual elimination.”
Those underground party members who had risked their lives and made significant contributions to help the CCP seize power were met with demotions, control, eliminations, endless interrogations, and even persecution leading to death after the CCP came to power.
Zou Dapeng and some other underground party members who had made significant contributions to the CCP’s occupation of the Northeast became targets for “elimination” during the Cultural Revolution. The one executing this “elimination” task was Kang Sheng, Mao Zedong’s political enforcer.
One of Kang Sheng’s significant tools in the Cultural Revolution for purging was arresting traitors. To root out the Northeast underground party entirely, Kang Sheng concocted the so-called “Northeast Gang counterrevolutionary traitor group.”
In 1967, Kang Sheng tasked special team members to investigate and frame the Chief Librarian of Dalian Museum, former Kuomintang Lieutenant General Qin Cheng. In 1946, Qin Cheng, representing the KMT’s Northeast Inspection Office, went to Harbin for negotiations with the Communist Army to exchange prisoners of war. With the arrangement of the CCP Central Northeast Bureau Social Department, Lu Zhengcao, Zhang Xuesi, Jie Fang, Yan Baohang, and 5 others engaged in negotiations with him.
During the Cultural Revolution, the investigators coerced Qin Cheng to admit that he had attempted to subvert Lu Zhengcao and the other 5 individuals during the Harbin negotiations in 1946, falsely accusing them of accepting subversion. This was the alleged reason for the formation of the “Northeast Gang counterrevolutionary traitor group,” to which the list later added names like Liu Lanbo, Jia Tao, Wan Yi, and 8 others. Subsequently, the CCP Central Committee established a second office of the Central Special Task Force specifically led by Minister of Public Security Xie Fuzhi to handle this case.
However, the special team could not find any evidence, so they made 42 people, including Lu Zhengcao, sign a joint letter to Chiang Kai-shek in February 1946 requesting the release of Zhang Xueliang as proof of their defection and betrayal, making them part of the “counterrevolutionary group.”
While Zou Dapeng served as the second minister of the CCP Central Northeast Bureau Social Department, he had direct and indirect contact with many individuals in the so-called “Northeast Gang counterrevolutionary traitor group.” Kang Sheng relentlessly accused Zou Dapeng of being a significant member of this group.
At first glance, Zou Dapeng seemed to be persecuted by Kang Sheng. However, the key to Kang Sheng being able to persecute Zou Dapeng lay in the CCP’s philosophy of struggle. Before 1949, the CCP called it “revolution,” and after 1949, especially during the Cultural Revolution, it was termed “continuing the revolution.”
Whether it was “revolution” or “continuing the revolution,” it meant continuously purging people; not only purging those outside the party but also within the party; the purging within the party was even more ruthless, labeled as “brutal struggle and relentless attacks.”
Looking back on Kang Sheng’s life, it seemed like he was born to purge people for the CCP, coinciding with two large-scale purges: the Yan’an Rectification Movement and the ten-year Cultural Revolution. He perfected the art of purging to the extreme, to the point where CCP elder Chen Yun called Kang Sheng “a demon, not a human.”
As mentioned above, purging underground party members was a set policy of the CCP. Coupled with the fact that Zou Dapeng and his archenemy Kong Yuan were on the same side, there was no escape from the inevitable fate.
“Da Ji Yuan First Release”