Deng Yanda (, 1 March 1895 – 29 November 1931) was a military officer in the Chinese Nationalist Party. He broke with party leaders in 1927, denouncing them as traitors to the party's original principles and in 1930 attempted to form a new party, which he called the Provisional Action Committee of the Chinese Nationalist Party or Third Party. It was later renamed the

Chinese Peasants' and Workers' Democratic Party The Chinese Peasants' and Workers' Democratic Party (CPWDP), also abbreviated in Chinese as Nonggongdang ( zh, s=农工党), t=, is one of the eight legally recognized political parties in the People's Republic of China under the direction of ...

. In 1931 he was convicted of treason by the Nationalist government and secretly executed. Today, Deng is recognized as a revolutionary martyr by the

People's Republic of China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

Life

Deng Yanda was born in

Huizhou Huizhou ( zh, c= ) is a city in central-east Guangdong Province, China, forty-three miles north of Hong Kong. Huizhou borders the provincial capital of Guangzhou to the west, Shenzhen and Dongguan to the southwest, Shaoguan to the north, Heyua ...

County,

Guangdong Guangdong (, ), alternatively romanized as Canton or Kwangtung, is a coastal province in South China on the north shore of the South China Sea. The capital of the province is Guangzhou. With a population of 126.01 million (as of 2020) ...

province. He was educated in military schools in Guangdong and Wuhan, graduating from

Baoding Military Academy Baoding Military Academy or Paoting Military Academy () was a military academy based in Baoding, during the late Qing dynasty and early Republic of China, in the first two decades of the 20th century. For a time, it was the most important milita ...

in 1919. Deng was recruited to the Guangdong Army in 1920 and fought under the Nationalist officer Deng Keng. When Sun Yat-sen announced his policy of alliance with the Soviet Union in 1923, Deng strongly supported it and was appointed to the preparatory committee for the

Whampoa Military Academy The Republic of China Military Academy () is the service academy for the army of the Republic of China, located in Fengshan District, Kaohsiung. Previously known as the the military academy produced commanders who fought in many of China ...

which the Russians helped the Chinese Nationalists build. He was an important commander in the

Northern Expedition The Northern Expedition was a military campaign launched by the National Revolutionary Army (NRA) of the Kuomintang (KMT), also known as the "Chinese Nationalist Party", against the Beiyang government and other regional warlords in 1926. The ...

(1926–1928) which the Nationalists launched to unify China. When

Chiang Kai-shek Chiang Kai-shek (31 October 1887 – 5 April 1975), also known as Chiang Chung-cheng and Jiang Jieshi, was a Chinese Nationalist politician, revolutionary, and military leader who served as the leader of the Republic of China (ROC) from 1928 ...

broke with the

Chinese Communist Party The Chinese Communist Party (CCP), officially the Communist Party of China (CPC), is the founding and One-party state, sole ruling party of the China, People's Republic of China (PRC). Under the leadership of Mao Zedong, the CCP emerged victoriou ...

and Russia, Deng denounced Chiang and left China for Russia and Europe, where he lived from 1927 to 1930.Boorman, "Teng Yen-ta" 263. On his return to China, Deng formed a new party, which he called the Provisional Action Committee of the Chinese Nationalist Party or Third Party (renamed

in 1947). By the mid-1920s, most of the Chinese political parties that were founded during the early years of the Republican era had disappeared from the political circles. There remained only two parties that became the decisive forces to the destiny of the country — the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the Kuomintang (KMT) after its reshuffle. In 1927, the cooperation between the CCP and the KMT broke down. Chiang Kai-shek brought a policy of slaughter and armed-suppression to the CCP. To contend against the KMT, the Chinese Communists were forced to shift their bases to the countryside and mountain areas. Since then, the prolonged life-and-death struggle between the two political parties emerged in China. Against the background of this division of Chinese politics into two opposing parties, Deng's party, also known as the Third Party came into being. Deng vigorously attacked Chiang Kai-shek as a dictator, angering the Nationalist government in Nanjing. He further angered them when he supported an anti-Chiang secessionist movement in Guangzhou in 1931. He was arrested in Shanghai's International Settlement on 17 August 1931, and extradited to Nanjing, where he was executed on 29 November 1931. His tomb is located near Sun Yat-sen's Mausoleum on

Zhongshan Zhongshan (; ) is a prefecture-level city in the south of the Pearl River Delta in Guangdong province, China. As of the 2020 census, the whole city with 4,418,060 inhabitants is now part of the Guangzhou–Shenzhen conurbation with 65,565,622 i ...

Mountain near

Nanjing Nanjing (; , Mandarin pronunciation: ), alternately romanized as Nanking, is the capital of Jiangsu province of the People's Republic of China. It is a sub-provincial city, a megacity, and the second largest city in the East China region. T ...

Political beliefs

Deng's views were socialist but after he left the Nationalists, he did not align with other parties, insisting that China's revolution should not be reined in to fit the needs of Russia or the Comintern. After Deng's death, his party supported the short-lived

Fujian People's Government The Fujian People's Government (or spelled as the Fukien People's Government) is the common name for the People's Revolutionary Government of the Republic of China (1933–1934) (), also known as the Fujian People's Government (), was a s ...

which opposed Chiang Kai-shek and sought an alliance with the Chinese Communists. The party eventually became one of the eight legal non-Communist parties in the People's Republic of China, where Deng is now recognised as a "Revolutionary Martyr." Although Deng's views are sometimes identified with those of

Soong Ching-ling Rosamond Soong Ch'ing-ling (27 January 189329 May 1981) was a Chinese political figure. As the third wife of Sun Yat-sen, then Premier of the Kuomintang and President of the Republic of China, she was often referred to as Madame Sun Yat-sen. ...

, Sun Yat-sen's widow, Soong did not join Deng's party and refused an offer to become its leader after his death.Epstein 257-259

Footnotes

References

* Boorman, Howard L. ed. ''Biographical Dictionary of Republican China''. New York: Columbia University Press, 1967–71. * Epstein, Israel. ''Woman in History: Life and Times of Soong Ching Ling (Mme. Sun Yatsen)''. 2nd ed. Beijing: New World Press, 1995.
Rulers, De-Dh

Modern China: An Encyclopedia of History, Culture, and Nationalism
{{DEFAULTSORT:Deng, Yanda 1895 births 1931 deaths People executed for treason against China People of the Northern Expedition Executed Republic of China people People executed by the Republic of China by firearm Politicians from Huizhou Hakka politicians Republic of China politicians from Guangdong Members of the Kuomintang Executed Chinese people Executed people from Guangdong Chinese Peasants' and Workers' Democratic Party politicians Martyrs Burials in Nanjing