ZHOU ENLAI 1898-1976

Joined Communist Party in 1921 in France before returning as political commissar at the Whampoa Military Accademy. He was present at the Shanghai massacre of 1927 and linked with urban revolutionaries before joining Mao in Jiangxi in 1932. After the 1935 Zunyi conference, he was appointed general political director of the Red Army and the Communist Party's public spokesman. After 1949 became the public face of Chinese Communism, as Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, playing the role of the pragmatist over Party policy. Masterminded the Nixon visit in 1972. A man of immense charm and diplomatic skill whose role in the Cultural Revolution is still debated.
Casalino Pierluigi, on 12th April 2014