Throughout the history of the People's Republic of China, the position that effectively reigned as the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces changed from time to time. During some periods, it was not exactly clear who was the supreme commander of the People's Liberation Army.
From 1954 to 1969, the de jure Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces was the President of the People's Republic of China, who was also the Chairman of the National Defence Council. However, a similar command structure inside the communist party known as the Party Central Military Commission, whose Chairman was the de facto Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces. The CMC Chairman, Mao Zedong, who from 1954 to 1959, was PRC's 1st President. Vice-Chairs included Liu Shaoqi, who from 1959 to 1969, was PRC's second president. Even though the President was the de jure supreme commander of the military, it nonetheless was a subordinate of the CMC Chairman.
From 1969 to 1978, the head of the military was the Chairman of the Central Committee of the CPC. This gave constitutional power to the head of the Chinese Communist Party.
From 1978 onwards, the Commander-in-Chief was the Chairman of the CMC. This position, however did not always give the person entitled the top command as was the case with Hua Guofeng. Deng Xiaoping was able to effectively control the military as the Chief of Staff of the PLA from 1978-1980.
Famous quotes containing the words supreme, military, command, people, republic and/or china:
“Mankind’s common instinct for reality ... has always held the world to be essentially a theatre for heroism. In heroism, we feel, life’s supreme mystery is hidden. We tolerate no one who has no capacity whatever for it in any direction. On the other hand, no matter what a man’s frailties otherwise may be, if he be willing to risk death, and still more if he suffer it heroically, in the service he has chosen, the fact consecrates him forever.”
—William James (1842–1910)
“In all sincerity, we offer to the loved ones of all innocent victims over the past 25 years, abject and true remorse. No words of ours will compensate for the intolerable suffering they have undergone during the conflict.”
—Combined Loyalist Military Command. New York Times, p. A12 (October 14, l994)
“For experience showed her that she had not, by marrying a man of a large fortune, obtained any great proportion of property which she could call her own or command at her pleasure.”
—Sarah Fielding (1710–1768)
“The English people believes itself to be free; it is gravely mistaken; it is free only during election of members of parliament; as soon as the members are elected, the people is enslaved; it is nothing. In the brief moment of its freedom, the English people makes such a use of that freedom that it deserves to lose it.”
—Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–1778)
“Who is this Renaissance? Where did he come from? Who gave him permission to cram the Republic with his execrable daubs?”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)
“Whether the nymph shall break Diana’s law,
Or some frail china jarreceive a flaw,
Or stain her honour, or her new brocade,”
—Alexander Pope (1688–1744)