Honor flag fluttering in the wind
On October 1, 2019, the celebration of the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China was held in Tiananmen Square in Beijing. The picture shows the marching battle flag team. Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Guo Xulei
In 2019, at the military parade celebrating the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China, along with the magnificent "Steel Torrent March", 100 honor flags of the Zhanqi team lined up through Tiananmen Square.
Where do these battle flags come from? How to name it? What's the point? Dr. Zhang Lei, a faculty member of the Joint Service College of National Defense University, will tell you the story behind the honor flag.
--editor
history
On the 70th anniversary of the National Day military parade, the 100 honorary flags played by the Zhanqi team are the flags obtained by units that have been awarded honorary titles, that is, the award flag.
The honor flag is inseparable from the honor title.
Since the establishment of our army, the first company that was awarded the honorary title was the 27th Regiment, 9th Division, 3rd Army, First Front Army of the Red Army. On December 27, 1930, in the first anti-"encirclement and suppression" operation, the company attacked the enemy's command post in one fell swoop and captured the enemy's frontline commander Zhang Hui-chan. The 3rd Army of the First Red Army immediately decided to award the 1st company the honorary title of "battle hero". After Comrade Mao Zedong heard this, he wrote "The First Encirclement and Suppression of the Fisherman's Ao·Fan". This unit later became the 3rd Company of the 380th Regiment of the 127th Division of the 54th Infantry Division of the 54th Army of the Army. This company can make award flags in accordance with the honorary titles and relevant regulations awarded in history.
The record of the honor flag awarded by our army can be traced back at least to the First National Congress of the Chinese Soviet on November 7, 1931. At that time, in order to carry forward the spirit of revolutionary heroes and actively carry out meritorious service and model creation activities, the conference awarded the 10 main Red Army red flags including Hubei, Henan, Anhui, Hunan, Hubei, and Central Soviet Area. For example, the Red 1st Army in the Hubei, Henan and Anhui Revolutionary Bases was awarded the "Courageous Decisive Victory" flag, and the Red 3rd Army of the Central Soviet Area was awarded the "Sacrifice Decisive Victory" flag.
Grant
For a long time, honorary titles have been the highest awards our army has given to units. According to the "Chinese People's Liberation Army Disciplinary Regulations (for Trial Implementation)" that came into effect on May 1, 2018, the honorary titles of individuals and units are determined by the Central Military Commission. Individuals will be awarded medals and certificates for heroes and award flags to units.
In the years of the Revolutionary War and the different historical periods after the founding of New China, the authority to grant honorary titles and flags was not limited to the Central Military Commission. The reason for this situation is mainly due to the decentralization of rewards to boost morale during the war. In addition to the Central Military Commission, various field troops, military regions, corps, corps (columns), and even division (brigade) levels have been granted honorary titles in different historical periods.
Among the units that have won honorary titles and award flags, the company-level units as the basic tactical units accounted for the largest proportion, reaching more than 60% of the total. The units awarded with the highest honorary titles are division-level units, such as the "Iron Army" in the battle flag phalanx (the 11th Division of the 4th Army of the First Red Army). The units with the lowest level of honorary titles are the classes, such as the "Yangtingan Class" and the "Dong Cunrui Class" in the phalanx.
name
The naming of the honor flag is mainly related to the honor title. What honorary title is awarded, what is written on the honor banner.
From the revolutionary war years to the peace building period, the naming of our military's honorary titles has also undergone a gradual process of standardization. Taking the banner team displayed in the National Day military parade as an example, it can be divided into the following categories:
Honorary titles named after combat locations: Linfen Brigade, Xiangyang Special Forces Regiment, Tashan Hero Regiment, Baiyun Mountain Regiment, Weixian Regiment, Luoyang Camp, Daduhe Company, etc.;
Honorary titles named after the names of famous generals and heroes: Zuoquan Independent Camp, Huang Jiguanglian, Wang Keqin Pai, etc.;
Honorary titles named after fighting spirit and style: Iron Hammer Group, Steel Group, Tiger Company, Steel Hero Company, etc.;
Honorary titles named after military exploits: assassination of the winning company, the second company of five battles and five victories, etc.;
There are also honorary titles named after their own service arms: Heroic Tank Battalion, Heroic Speedboat, Meritorious Tank, Sea Pioneer, etc.;
Of course, there are several naming methods mentioned above.
Another situation is that some units have been awarded different honorary titles many times in history, such as the "Pingxingguan War Assault Company" in the Zhanqi phalanx. The company was again awarded the honorary title of "Military and Political Double Winning Company" in the second month after it was awarded the honorary title. This is not uncommon in the history of our army.
Selection
The flags presented in the military parade were all made later, so they were uniform in the square team. In fact, the flags of honorary units such as the Tashan Heroes Group have been collected and displayed in the military museum because of their age and for the purpose of cultural relic preservation. However, the flag displayed in this military parade still retains the original flag.
The 100 honor flags show the battle flags of our army's honorable troops during the Agrarian Revolutionary War, the Anti-Japanese War, the Liberation War, and since the founding of New China. Although these are not all of them, they can be used to give a complete picture of the glory of our army in different historical periods. Behind each banner is a glorious battle history, and under each banner stands a lively fighting collective.
In 2012, the "List of Heroes and Model Units of the Chinese People's Liberation Army and Armed Police Forces" compiled by the former General Political Department included 3114 heroes and model units since the establishment of the army. To this day, there are still outstanding units joining this rank. Behind each honor unit is not only a banner of honor fluttering in the wind, but also a concentrated display of our army’s glorious history, supreme glory and heroic groups in different historical periods, which has a strong contemporary and educational significance.
Tips·The first military flag of our army
The flag of the Workers’ and Peasants’ Revolutionary Army for the Autumn Harvest Uprising was designed by He Changgong and Chen Shuhua, Zhong Wenzhang and Yang Lisan who were in the division staff at that time. He Changgong recalled in "Tough Years" that the superiors did not have a clear pattern at the time. They repeatedly studied and believed that the military flag should highlight the theme of the army as the workers and peasants under the leadership of the Communist Party and not afraid of bloodshed and sacrifice for the revolution. Therefore, they used a bright red flag as a background to symbolize the revolution; a large white five-pointed star was used in the center of the flag to symbolize the leadership of the party; the inside of the five-pointed star was a crossed sickle and axe pattern, implying the close unity of workers and farmers; near the flagpole There is a blank margin of 10 centimeters wide, on which is written "The First Division of the First Army of the Workers' and Peasants Revolutionary Army" in traditional characters. (Reporter Ni Guanghui)
"People's Daily" (version 05 on August 1, 2020)