Zhou Enlai, born on this day in 1898, was a communist revolutionary, statesman, and military officer who served as the 1st Premier of the People's Republic of China from 1949 to 1976. "All diplomacy is a continuation of war by other means."
Zhou was educated in a missionary college in Tianjin before studying at a Japanese university. In Tianjin, he met his future wife, Deng Yingchao while participating in a radical political group known as the "Awakening Society". In 1920, Zhou moved to France, where he helped form the overseas branch of the Communist Party of China. He also lived in Britain and Germany before returning to China in 1924.
While working in the Political Department of the Whampoa Military Academy, Zhou was also made the secretary of the Communist Party of Guangdong-Guangxi, and served as the CPC representative with the rank of major-general.
After the Chinese Civil War broke out in 1927, Zhou served in the communist forces, helping establish and oversee a network of underground cells of communist resistance. Zhou played a leading role in the Long March of 1934-35, an arduous military retreat of communist forces over 8,000 miles.
Following the Zunyi Conference in 1935, Mao Zedong became Zhou's assistant. After the conclusion of the Long March, Mao officially took over Zhou Enlai's leading position in the CPC, while Zhou took a secondary position as vice-chairman. Both would hold their leadership positions until their deaths in 1976.
Zhou was a prominent participant in the 1955 Asian–African Conference, held in Indonesia. The conference produced a declaration in strongly in favor of peace, the abolition of nuclear arms, general arms reduction, and the principle of universal representation at the United Nations. Zhou was critical of American imperial aggression and stated "the population of Asia will never forget that the first atom bomb was exploded on Asian soil."
Zhou passed away from bladder cancer on January 8th, 1976, just nine months before Mao Zedong's death in September that year.
"Today the first unification of the Chinese people has emerged. The people themselves have become the masters of Chinese soil, and the rule of the reactionaries in China has been irrevocably overthrown."
Zhou Enlai, from "Chinese People Will not Tolerate Aggression" (October 1950)
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I had this thought the other day but we would be in such a weird timeline if the U.S. had sexenios like they do in Mexico rather than 2 4-year terms. Sure things would be like 99% similar and it’d just be changes in who manages capitalism, but if I had to guess it’d be like this:
Bush would be president from 2000-2006, so everything would be the same in that regard. While Obama may have a shot at presidency in a 2006 election since he first gained attention for his 2004 DNC speech, he can’t run on hope and change in response to the 2008 Recession so I think Hillary Clinton would actually have a better chance and would be president from 2006-2012. Foreign policy would likely be the same, maybe even more hawkish, but the recession would happen under her presidency rather than Bush which is just hilarious to think about. But also, without Obama, Trump doesn’t gain the political clout he did with the birtherism, so I think from 2012-2018, the likely president would be Mitt Romney (or maybe even Ted Cruz?) to “stabilize” capitalism after Clinton and the 2008 Recession, especially as the bailouts would be framed as establishment Democrat governance. Maybe even the ACA passes under a Romney presidency instead which would also be hilarious. But you’d have the same factors that contributed to the election of Trump in the mid 2010s (Rust Belt deindustrialization, immigration, social media, austerity, etc.) so I think you’d have some sort of populist campaign, maybe Bernie or a non-Trump Republican populist. If Bernie wins, he’d be president during COVID, 2022 inflation, Ukraine war, Gaza genocide, etc., which would be pretty disasterous for the perception of “democratic socialism” in America meaning you’d probably get someone like Ron DeSantis (or even Tucker Carlson) in 2024-2030. But if a Republican won in 2018, you’d probably get like a Gavin Newsome in 2024 as a “return to normalcy” president like Biden but without Biden as he wouldn’t have the Obama stimulus.
That was kind of a long winded alt history fan fic but we would be so close to having a slightly “funnier” timeline if we were a little more like Mexico (idk if funny is the right word considering all of the horrible things still happen, but like first woman president? Recession. A republican passing the ACA instead of Obama. Social democracy becoming completely unviable in American electoral politics, etc). Someone should make like a Disco Elysium type game in this timeline
6 year terms also shifts the whole timeline leading up to 2000, we would have had one election in 98 instead of the two in 96+2000, and 200 years of historical events would have happened under different admins with potentially different outcomes and reactions