The importance of science and technology to a country is self-evident, and whether a country is strong or not has a great relationship with the country's scientific and technological strength.
In ancient times, China's science and technology was at the forefront of the world. Time came to modern times, due to the Qing Dynasty's closed country, resulting in China's scientific and technological development and foreign derailment.
When the West was changing, the Qing Dynasty was still immersed in its own dream, and after the Industrial Revolution, the West, science and technology were obviously more advanced than the Eastern countries, and China's scientific and technological strength was not as good as that of the West from then on.
To be backward is to be beaten, and this is a bloody lesson in history, and we must deeply remember it. Since the beginning of the Opium War, the great powers have intermittently invaded The land of China has been invaded for a hundred years.
Over the past hundred years, the people of Chinese have suffered endless humiliations, paid a huge price of casualties, and have easily driven out the invaders and established a new China in which the people are the masters of their own affairs.
After the founding of New China, the leaders of the country deeply understood the importance of the development of science and technology to the destiny of a country, and it is necessary to develop science and technology and to have talents. After the founding of New China, many foreign talents with patriotic hearts and profound knowledge came to the motherland to contribute to the construction of New China.
Among the many talents who have contributed to the construction of New China, we have to mention one person, and he is Qian Xuesen, the father of China's missiles. After Qian Xuesen learned of the founding of New China, he immediately decided to return to the motherland and make his own contribution to the motherland, which was still poor and backward at that time.
At that time, Qian Xuesen developed very well in the United States, with a very high social status, a good scientific research environment, and a high salary, but these Qian Xuesen did not care, in order to return to China, he gave up the Nobel Prize that he hoped to get, gave up everything in the United States, only to return to China to develop and dedicate his own strength to the motherland.
Qian Xuesen's road back to China was quite bumpy, and the United States used all means to prevent him from returning to China. In that year, in order to get Qian Xuesen to return to China, Premier Zhou thought of many ways, and China also made greater concessions and paid a relatively large price, and in the end, the tortured Qian Xuesen finally boarded the cruise ship back to China on September 17, 1955, and left the United States.
Qian Xuesen's difficult journey back to China
In 1950, when Qian Xuesen proposed to the United States to return to China, he was immediately blocked by the United States, which used a variety of methods, such as withholding passports, house arrest, surveillance and other means, with the intention of preventing Qian Xuesen from returning to China.
Americans know how strong Qian Xuesen's ability is, and they also know how much Qian Xuesen will help China if he returns to China.
In order to prevent Qian Xuesen from returning to China, in 1949, the United States first revoked his certificate of being able to participate in classified scientific research on the charge of "refusing to expose Communist Party friends."
This move not only failed to shake Qian Xuesen's confidence in returning to China, but on the contrary, it saw the true face of the US side more clearly and strengthened his belief in returning to China. In 1950, he boarded a cruise ship to China, but was stopped by the customs police and did not allow him to return to China.
Since then, Qian Xuesen has been persecuted by the Us side for a long time, first in prison, detained for fourteen days, fortunately thanks to the California Institute of Technology as a guarantee, after spending a huge deposit of 15,000 US dollars, Qian Xuesen was released, but still can not return to China.
During that time, Qian Xuesen was facing tremendous pressure, he lost thirty pounds in January, his home was raided by the immigration bureau, and the customs confiscated all his luggage, which contained a large number of Notes and books from Qian Xuesen, which were Qian Xuesen's previous data research and scientific research books.
U.S. Navy Vice Secretary Danny Jimble, who met Qian Xuesen, said:
"Wherever Qian Xuesen goes, he is worthy of the strength of 5 divisions."
It can be seen that the US side knows Qian Xuesen's strength very well and is reluctant to let him return to China to build his hometown. For a long time, Qian Xuesen lost his freedom and could not freely enter and exit the laboratory to do scientific research, and his personal freedom was greatly restricted.
In the early 1950s, the news that Qian Xuesen wanted to return to China but was blocked and persecuted by the Us side reached China, which attracted the attention of many people, and while sympathizing with Qian Xuesen, he attacked the US behavior of restricting personal freedom. In addition, China's scientific community is also doing its best to help Qian Xuesen return to China, which even alarmed the top leaders of the central government at that time.
Go all out to assist Qian Xuesen
Given Qian Xuesen's influence abroad and his determination to return to China, senior leaders are very concerned about his situation in the United States. To this end, China has publicly spoken out internationally and strongly condemned the US side for illegally putting Qian Xuesen under house arrest and restricting his personal freedom and will.
In 1954, Qian Xuesen in the United States saw a photo from the Tiananmen Tower, in which Qian Xuesen recognized his father's good friend Chen Shutong. In view of the fact that Chen Shutong was already a vice chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress at that time, Qian Xuesen believed that Chen Shutong might have the ability to help him convey his wish to the motherland to return to China.
Qian Xuesen wrote a letter to Chen Shutong, in which Qian Xuesen did not say much, mainly asking the government of the motherland to help him leave the United States and return to the motherland. Chen Shutong, who received the letter, did not dare to delay for a moment, and directly went to Premier Zhou and conveyed Qian Xuesen's wish to him.
At this time, shortly after the end of the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, Premier Zhou also took time out of his busy schedule to rush around for Qian Xuesen's return to China. It was precisely at this time that Chen Shutong handed Over Qian Xuesen's letter to Premier Zhou, which made Premier Zhou feel that it was imminent to rescue Qian Xuesen and help him return to China.
Just at this time, an opportunity appeared, after the Korean War, in order to solve the post-war problems in Korea, China and the United States, the Soviet Union, France and other countries held a meeting in the Conference Room in Geneva. The meeting was personally attended by Premier Zhou to consult with various countries on how to deal with the peace issues in North Korea and India.
At the Geneva Conference, the U.S. representatives negotiated with our country through Britain, hoping that the Chinese side would release the American soldiers they had captured by the Volunteers during the Korean War. At that time, China and the United States were in a state of hostility, and the United States expressed their intentions to our country through the British representative to China, William Du.
Premier Zhou thought it was a great opportunity because we had a lot of American pilots captured in the Korean War and American spies who had infiltrated China. The US side hopes that these people can return to China, this is the demand of the US side, since it is an appeal, we also have our demands, we hope that Chinese students like Qian Xuesen will return to China.
After Premier Zhou learned of this, premier Zhou first attacked the United States internationally for violating human rights and prevented Qian Xuesen and others from returning to China, and then privately released China's willingness to negotiate with the United States.
In the end, our side sent a negotiator, Wang Bingnan, to negotiate directly with the US representative Johnson. The whole negotiation process was not very smooth, and the US side still put its posture very high, only to explain that they demanded that the Chinese side release the US prisoners, but did not mention that Qian Xuesen and other Chinese students were prevented by the US side and could not return to China.
After two rounds of negotiations, the results of the negotiations have not made practical progress, but both sides still have the idea of continuing consultations. In order to show its sincerity, the Chinese side first released 4 captured US pilots after the peace talks, and after seeing China's sincerity, the US side welcomed the continuation of the peace talks.
In 1955, Wang Bingnan was appointed Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of China to Poland, and in July of the same year, the United States signaled to the Chinese side that it intended to hold an ambassadorial-level negotiation. As soon as this news came out, it immediately made headlines in the world news, because the actions of China and the United States have always been the focus of the world's attention.
In the ambassadorial-level talks, the negotiation process is still not smooth, the US side insisted on the release of US prisoners in China first, as for Qian Xuesen and others, the US side said on the pretext that there is no evidence that Qian Xuesen and others have the will to return to China. At this time, the letter that Qian Xuesen had written to Chen Shutong had played a role.
After the Chinese representative showed ironclad evidence, the US side previously insisted that "there is no evidence that Chinese living in the United States want to go back" is self-defeating. In the end, after consultation, the United States agreed to release Qian Xuesen, and on August 4, the United States canceled the imprisonment of Qian Xuesen and other Chinese and allowed them to return to China.
epilogue
In order to let Qian Xuesen and other patriots return to China, Premier Zhou and others did their best to help them; if there was no Good Offices from Premier Zhou, he used facts to persuade the US side and use diplomacy to put pressure on the US side, believing that the US side would not let Qian Xuesen and others return to China so easily.
In order to let Qian Xuesen and other patriots return to China, China also paid a huge price and made some concessions in the negotiations, including the release of 11 US military pilots prisoners. But judging from the results, all this is worth it, and the return of Qian Xuesen and others has given the motherland a huge return.