news

한어Русский языкEnglishFrançaisIndonesianSanskrit日本語DeutschPortuguêsΕλληνικάespañolItalianoSuomalainenLatina

·in 1984, deng jiaxian was checking books and information.

“i'm going to finish this thing,

it's worth dying for. "

author: chen jiali

"have you heard of deng jiaxian?"

in the 1980s, yang zhenning asked a college student who graduated from peking university in nuclear physics in china. seeing the other party shaking his head, yang zhenning was extremely shocked, saying that deng jiaxian had made such a great contribution to the country that chinese college students studying nuclear physics didn't even know his name.

that's because, due to the need for confidentiality, the three words "deng jiaxian" cannot be related to nuclear weapons. it was not until a month before his death in 1986 that the "declassification" work began.

on july 29, 1996, china conducted its last nuclear test to date and announced a moratorium on nuclear testing from the next day. this day is the 10th anniversary of deng jiaxian's death.

on june 25, 2024, the chang'e-6 returner landed, achieving the world's first sample return from the far side of the moon. this day is the 100th anniversary of deng jiaxian’s birth.

his memory is so deeply engraved in countless details of building a technologically powerful country.

deng jiaxian’s wife and nephew xu jin has been promoting the “deng jiaxian spirit” over the years. the question he often has to answer is: what should we learn from deng jiaxian today? "we have the right to pursue a better life. deng jiaxian fought hard at all costs, and his goal was to make generations of chinese people live better. however, once national interests and personal interests conflict, we can obey the national interests. this is the meaning of learning from deng jiaxian ." xu jin told the global people reporter.

·xu jin's memory article about his uncle deng jiaxian was included in the book "deng jiaxian, a role model for intellectuals". (photo by our reporter hou xinying/photo)

a belief

yang zhenning and deng jiaxian were classmates in middle school and university. they even lived in the same room while studying in the united states. in yang zhenning's words, "the friendship of 50 years is as close as brothers." yang zhenning's evaluation of deng jiaxian is: "deng jiaxian's life was directional and consciously moving forward, without hesitation or contradiction. if jiaxian chooses his path again, he will still follow the path he has already taken."

his path is to make the poor and backward motherland strong.

in 1948, deng jiaxian went to the department of physics of purdue university in the united states for further study. before leaving, his friend yuan yonghou said to him: "the birth of new china will not be very far away. it will be dawn soon!" with the belief that "it will be dawn soon", deng jiaxian turned away from the coolness he had when he was studying in china. i am very cool and study very hard in the united states. it only took 1 year and 11 months for deng jiaxian to obtain his doctorate. he was only 26 years old at the time and was known as "doctor doll".

·in 1950, deng jiaxian returned to china after studying in the united states. the picture shows yang zhenning (first from left), his younger brother yang zhenping (first from right) and deng jiaxian while studying in the united states.

while at purdue university, deng jiaxian frequently received funding from chen ning yang. during the holidays, deng jiaxian would also go to the princeton institute of advanced physics where yang zhenning worked to find him. chenning yang was a postdoctoral researcher at the institute, and robert oppenheimer, who developed the first atomic bomb in 1945, was director of the institute at the time.

to this day, many people still compare deng jiaxian and oppenheimer. yang zhenning has worked with oppenheimer for 17 years. he is a close friend with deng jiaxian and is one of the people with the most say. he said: "oppenheimer is a complex person. there are many people who admire him and admire him. there are many people who don't like him. deng jiaxian is the least noticeable person. after talking to him for a few minutes, you can see that he is an honest and honest person, and he is never arrogant. i like the character represented by the word 'pure' throughout my life."

yang zhenning made a sharp assessment: if oppenheimer and deng jiaxian changed positions, it would be impossible for them to successfully lead their respective countries' atomic bomb projects.

from the day he refused his mentor to take him to the uk for further studies in 1950 and chose to return to china, deng jiaxian's fate was linked to china's atomic bomb.

in october 1951, the second year after he returned to china, the famous physicist marie curie asked chinese radiochemist yang chengzong to bring a message to chairman mao zedong: "if you want to oppose the atomic bomb, you must first have an atomic bomb yourself." marie curie he also gave 10 grams of radioactive radium made by himself to yang chengzong and asked him to take it back to china.

in january 1955, the fifth year after he returned to china, chairman mao zedong presided over an enlarged meeting of the secretariat of the central committee of the communist party of china and made strategic decisions to develop china's atomic energy industry.

in august 1958, the eighth year after he returned to china, he gave up his comfortable life and went into hiding to develop nuclear weapons for his motherland.

a secret

"i'm changing jobs."

"where will it be transferred?"

"i don't know."

"what work?"

"i don't know, and i can't tell."

"then, when you get to your new place of work, send me a letter and tell me the email address for replying to it, okay?"

"probably none of these will work either."

on the night of the transfer, deng jiaxian and his wife xu luxi had a long talk and stayed up all night. they talked about poor and backward china and the korean war. at the end, deng jiaxian suddenly said: "i can no longer take care of family affairs from now on. my life will be handed over to my future work. if i do this well, it will be worth dying for."

xu luxi began to cry. she was only in her early 30s and had children aged 4 and 2. deng jiaxian's parents suffered from lung disease, xu luxi's mother was also in poor health, and the family had a heavy burden. but she still said firmly: "i support you."

on october 16, 1964, my country's first atomic bomb was successfully detonated. the streets of beijing were crowded with people rushing to buy copies of the people's daily. everyone rushed to tell each other and felt proud and proud.

a few days later, the famous physicist yan jici visited xu deheng's home. xu deheng asked excitedly: "who has such great ability to create the atomic bomb?" yan jici said with a smile: "hey, you still ask me, go ask your son-in-law!"

"that sentence is like breaking the window." xu jin told the global people reporter that his grandfather xu deheng set rules for the whole family. deng jia came to the house first, and no one could ask him about work matters.

to this day, no matter how hard xu jin searches his memory to find possible "flaws" in his uncle's words, "there are only two times, and they seem to be slightly related to his work."

once, it was deng jiaxian who was chatting with xu jin and said, "everyone calls me the blessed general. i was born in the year of jiazi. jia is the head of the heavenly stems and zi is the head of the earthly branches, so i am the blessed general." xu jin was confused and didn't understand what his uncle meant by "fujiang". it was not until after deng jiaxian's death that his contribution was declassified, and xu jin suddenly realized that in the 22 years from 1964 to 1986, china had conducted a total of 32 nuclear tests, 15 of which were conducted by deng jiaxian and personally directed on site. each time they were successful, , colleagues therefore called him "fortunate general".

"the so-called 'lucky general' does not mean how lucky he is, it is all obtained with great efforts." xu jin lamented to the reporter of "global people": "before each nuclear test detonates, my uncle, as the technical person in charge, when he wanted to sign, his hands were shaking, his palms were cold, and his whole body was sweating. it was an unimaginable pressure for ordinary people. "

·in september 1979, an important airdrop nuclear test accident occurred. deng jiaxian (left) entered the accident site twice to find out the cause.

another "connection" occurred after the college entrance examination was resumed. deng jiaxian was also chatting with xu jin, and suddenly fell into deep thought, muttering to himself: "our base is too hard, and some colleagues are even harder. what if their children can't go to college? our parents have already dedicated themselves to the country. you can't waste your life with the children..." xu jin looked at his uncle's worried look with a confused look on his face, not knowing what he meant by "the base is too bitter".

on june 24, 1986, "people's daily" and "liberation army daily" simultaneously published the article "deng jiaxian, the hero of the two bombs". at this moment, xu jin and his family, together with people all over china, finally knew the "secret" that his uncle had hidden in his heart for 28 years. "my aunt has always kept a copy of that day's newspaper. my aunt passed away 35 days later."

an ordinary person

after deng jiaxian passed away, xu luxi suggested that we should not only promote deng jiaxian's heroism and achievements, but also write about his life. "he was actually an ordinary person."

xu jin also specifically clarified to the global people reporter that there is a common misunderstanding in the outside world that during the 28 years that deng jiaxian remained anonymous, he could not go home or see his family, and he was already seriously ill when he returned. "in fact, it's not the case. in those years, my uncle's work was mainly at bases in qinghai and sichuan, and he would occasionally return to beijing. for example, when the work made certain progress, he would come back to report to the leading comrades of the party central committee. sometimes, the leadership's schedule was not arranged after that, he went back to his home in the western suburbs of beijing to briefly reunite with his wife and children. in his uncle’s words, he went back to beijing on a business trip.”

if it's a weekend when he returns to beijing, deng jiaxian will go to his father-in-law xu deheng's house for lunch with his wife and children. most of the times xu jin saw his uncle were at the dinner table at his grandfather's house. here is a record of the daily life of "ordinary person" deng jiaxian and his family.

"my uncle is a very chatty and active person. he has almost all the hobbies you can think of, including watching movies, watching peking opera, playing bridge, chess, table tennis, swimming, smoking, drinking, and going out to restaurants... i like it." xu jin said.

once, xu deheng and his wife knew that deng jia was coming, so they prepared his favorite shrimp. as a result, he took the children and showed up after dinner. it turned out that he was going to the downstairs restaurant of hongbin in xidan. hongbin tower was always full, and everyone was surprised that he could get a seat. deng jiaxian smiled and shared with xu jin and the others the tips for occupying seats: "you need to first determine which table is about to have all the dishes, and also pay attention to whether they are sharing a table, and then wait behind the people at this table."

deng jiaxian is known as a "gourmet". there are always white rabbit milk candies and sour three-color candies hidden in his office drawer. when work progresses, he takes them out like magic and shares them with everyone. sometimes, he would take his colleagues out to eat crabs and roasted sweet potatoes. as soon as everyone shouted "old deng is treating us", he immediately paid for it.

deng jiaxian's life was simple and not so particular, but he was not an ascetic. "my uncle likes to smoke, and he only smokes good cigarettes, peony brand or chinese brand." xu jin said. he later heard his uncle's old colleagues tell him that because his uncle was an easy-going person, when his colleagues went to his place for a meeting, they would look for cigarettes in his pockets and "it's good to smoke one at lao deng's place."

deng jiaxian loves to watch peking opera, but he has no time to queue up to buy tickets. if he returned to beijing and the meeting ended early in the afternoon, he would go to the entrance of the people's theater to try his luck to see if anyone would refund their tickets. "he can accurately judge who has a refunded ticket, and immediately goes up to him with the money and takes the ticket. he almost never fails." xu jin said that theater fans call this "ticket fishing." yu min, another theater fan who was one of the founders of "two bombs and one star", was too embarrassed to "fish for tickets", but deng jiaxian didn't care so much.

someone asked xu luxi what was the biggest sacrifice for his family after deng jiaxian developed nuclear weapons. xu luxi replied, "they lost their relaxed, happy, leisure and comfortable living environment." at the same time, they also temporarily distanced themselves from "ordinary people" deng jiaxian.

·in 1962, deng jiaxian and his family took a group photo at peking university.

an old house

in august this year, xu luxi spent her 96th birthday in the old house she and deng jiaxian shared. she has always lived there. this old house built in the 1960s does not have an elevator. it has become increasingly inconvenient for xu luxi to go up and down the stairs, but she would rather not go out than move.

in the house of less than 60 square meters, all the furniture and furnishings are basically as they were when deng jiaxian was alive. a bright red, old-fashioned dial telephone on the desk is no longer in use, but it is still there, covered in a transparent plastic bag like many other objects in the house that bear deng jiaxian's mark. in each bag was a note written by xu luxi with a brush, "deng jia used it first."

the two single sofas were covered with layers of cushions because their springs were almost worn out. the sofa was specially borrowed by deng jiaxian from his work unit in 1971 to receive yang zhenning who returned to china to visit relatives. in 2016, yang zhenning went to visit xu luxi. as soon as he entered the door, he sat on the same sofa as 45 years ago.

·in 2016, yang zhenning went to visit xu luxi and sat on the same sofa that he had sat on 45 years ago.

"every time i visit my aunt, i need an adaptation process because the furnishings and furniture at home are so old." xu jin said.

once, xu jin saw a crack in the wooden door of the balcony and suggested, "auntie, let me fill the crack for you, otherwise cold wind will come in in winter and hot air will come in in summer." xu luxi replied: "don't touch it, your aunt." when i was alive, there was this crack.”

"what my aunt has been pursuing in her life is not material life, which is not enough to please her spiritual world, so she has never thought about changing the house. this is the place where she and her uncle once lived, and it holds too many memories. she is reluctant to move. let’s go.” xu jin said.

a few months before his death, deng jiaxian secretly "escaped" from the hospital and returned home. what he misses is not only the people at home, nor just the house at home, but the life of the whole family having dinner together at home. looking at the familiar bed, sofa, red telephone, and the terrace where he and his son had set off firecrackers, he knew that it would be difficult for him to return to this home. he only hoped to keep these memories forever...