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China Celebrates Its Communist Party's Centennial With Spectacle
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China Celebrates Its Communist Party's Centennial With Spectacle
China's ruling Communist Party is throwing itself a party, kicking off a month of celebrations today to memorialize its founding 100 years ago.To get more news about China communist party 100th year anniversary, you can visit shine news official website.
Across China, newspapers and buildings alike have been blanketed in red party propaganda. Three Chinese astronauts in space beamed back congratulations to the party. And online censors and police have been working overtime for the past month to ensure no disturbances mar the heavily scripted ceremonies held in Beijing today.
Beijing's celebrations began with a patriotic show in Tiananmen Square. As helicopters and fighter jets flew overhead, hundreds of school children, party members, and front-line health care workers sang songs like, "Socialism Is Good" and "Without the Chinese Communist Party, There Would Be No New China."But the centerpiece of the celebrations was a fiery speech given by Communist Party Chairman Xi Jinping.
"The Chinese people will never allow any foreign forces to bully, oppress or enslave us. Anyone who dares will have their heads cracked and their blood will flow before the steel Great Wall built with the flesh and blood of 1.4 billion Chinese people," said Xi, as he stood in front of Beijing's imperial palace on Thursday morning.Wearing a grey Mao suit and flanked by party leaders past and present, Xi spent more than an hour laying out the Communist Party's achievements over the past century while making the case that it remains the only political force capable of governing China.
"The Communist Party of China and the Chinese people, with their bravery and tenacity, solemnly proclaim to the world that the Chinese people are not only good at taking down the old world, but also good at building a new one," Xi proclaimed. "Only socialism can save China, and only socialism with Chinese characteristics can develop China."China's Communist Party was actually founded on July 23, 1921 by a mixture of Chinese and foreign revolutionaries in Shanghai.
Fearful of spies, a group of Chinese-only members reached their final agreements on a boat in nearby Zhejiang province. However, nearly two decades later, party leaders sheltering in the dusty caves of China's northern city of Yan'an decided July 1 would be the official date of commemoration.
For Xi and other leaders at the helm of the party, this year's birthday is an important chance to recast an organization originally designed to foment revolution among rural peasants into one that can be seen as a powerful government overseeing an increasingly sophisticated global economy.
Party leaders must do so in a world that is now largely hostile to its global ambitions. The latest Pew Research polling shows negative views on China remain at historic highs around the world, spurred on by China's increasingly aggressive diplomats and nationalistic citizens.In his speech, Xi sought to reassure other countries that China's rise was peaceful — yet vowed to conquer Taiwan, a democratic island China claims at its own. "A strong country must have a strong army. Only a strong army means a safe country," Xi said.
He also said Beijing would maintain its iron grip over Hong Kong. By no coincidence, July 1 is also the anniversary for the resumption of Chinese control over Hong Kong. The same date was then chosen to implement a sweeping National Security Law, which already has quieted nearly all dissent in the territory.
Key among the achievements Xi listed in the party's centennial celebrations was the elimination of extreme poverty and a series of economic reform that unleashed a commercial boom while also widening social inequality.
But the primary raison d'être for the Communist Party always has been pursuing what the party calls the "great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation" — a nation that, in 1921, remained ravaged by civil war, imperial mismanagement, and foreign colonialism. On this count, China now boasts an economic might that can cripple smaller economics, and a geopolitical heft that has earned it spots in nearly every major multilateral institution.
"Back then we lagged so far behind. We could only look up at Western countries. We were standing at the bottom of the stairs when the West was at the top," said Hu Xijin, the editor in chief of the Global Times, a nationalist government paper. "Nowadays China has caught up with the rest of the world. China's economy has expanded and with it, its general power."