The Post-'90s Party Committee Secretary with a Remarkable Record, Called by Officers and Soldiers 'A Party Delegate Who Is Equally Capable in Wen and Wu'

Wu Ge, Party Committee Secretary and Political Instructor of a Rocket Force Battalion—A Party Delegate Equally Capable in Wen and Wu

■ PLA Daily Special Correspondent Li Yinghong, Li Ping

Deep in the mountains, a live-combat-condition operational training exercise had just sounded the gong to end, and the operators had not yet washed off the dust of the field when Wu Ge, Party Committee Secretary and Political Instructor of a Rocket Force battalion, gathered everyone beside the launch frame. A brief on-the-spot "combat-position party-spirit after-action review (战位党性复盘会)" got underway.

"During the fueling phase, Staff Sergeant First Class Li Jie assessed the risk and stepped forward to handle it—that deserves recognition. But the handoff between positions in the second element was not smooth; awareness of covering positions still needs to be strengthened..." There were no empty words or stock phrases. Everyone spoke in turn, airing both achievements and shortcomings. In just over ten minutes, the performance of Party members had been thoroughly discussed, and responsibility areas for the next round of hard fighting were assigned on the spot.

The post-'90s Party committee secretary standing before them has a remarkable record: he enlisted in 2009, joined the Party the following year, was elected as a delegate to the Rocket Force's Second Party Congress, and has been recognized as an Outstanding Party Affairs Worker of the Rocket Force, a Model Grassroots Commander of the Rocket Force (火箭军基层好主官标兵), and an Outstanding Political Cadre of the Rocket Force. He has been awarded one individual second-class merit citation and two third-class merit citations. In the eyes of the officers and soldiers, more than these weighty honors, they prefer to call him affectionately "a Party delegate who is equally capable in wen and wu (能文能武的党代表)."

From the day he became a Party affairs worker, Wu Ge has continually pondered: in a strategic missile force that wields the great nation's long sword, how can grassroots Party affairs work truly serve the goal of winning? Years of practice have brought him ever-greater clarity: "For organizational strength to reach every combat position directly, the fighting fortress (战斗堡垒) must be built beneath every launch frame." He often tells the Party member cadres around him: "Party affairs work is absolutely not a self-contained 'rotation' (自转) divorced from the battlefield—it is a 'revolution' (公转) in service of winning. Only by converting the political and organizational advantages of the Party organization into advantages for victory, and converting the vanguard and exemplary role of Party members into assault strength, can Party-building work truly become a force multiplier for combat effectiveness."

When he first took up his post in the battalion, Wu Ge plunged into the tunnels and lived with the squads and platoons, quickly identifying the bottlenecks in the unit's organizational development: position sites were dispersed, duty tasks ran continuously around the clock, and by-the-book organizational life was constantly competing for time with training tasks—the problem of Party-building and combat readiness being "two separate skins (两张皮)" persisted.

How to break through? He fixed on one principle: "If the fortress is not built strong, the battlefield cannot be won. Organizational development must be tightly integrated with combat effectiveness development."

Accordingly, Wu Ge began experimenting with abandoning the fixed model of "centralized lectures and uniform note-taking," moving "impromptu classrooms, discussion classrooms, soldier classrooms, and online classrooms" into the tunnels and onto the position sites. During training breaks they talked through lessons learned; during operational breaks they explained key points—breaking down big principles into plain talk that officers and soldiers could absorb and remember. Tied to specific tasks, he took the lead in establishing a working closed loop of "pre-task mobilization and oath-taking, Party member hard-fighting during the task, and dual after-action review following the task"—the "tactical after-action review (战术复盘)" identifies shortfalls in combat effectiveness, while the "party-spirit after-action review (党性复盘)" examines how well Party members fulfilled their role. The two agendas are conducted together and corrected in parallel, embedding Party-building work concretely into the entire combat-readiness process.

One year, higher authorities issued a certain system test-and-verification task, and the battalion was ordered to lead the hard-fighting effort. There was no mature experience to draw on, the operational environment was enclosed and arduous, and the technical specifications were stringent—many officers and soldiers were inwardly apprehensive. Without a second word, Wu Ge took the lead in going into the tunnels for resident training, working overtime alongside technical backbone personnel to grind through parameters and troubleshoot faults. At the task front line, he took the lead in establishing a Party member assault team, planting the Party flag at the forefront of the tests. He held "micro Party classes (微党课)" at fault-troubleshooting sites, and at every bottleneck organized Party member backbone personnel to hold "Zhuge Liang conferences (诸葛亮会)"—both to work through difficult problems and to boost morale. In the end, the task was completed successfully, and the relevant results provided strong support for upgrading combat readiness support capabilities.

"In every urgent, difficult, dangerous, and arduous task, you can always see the political instructor charging at the front. Wherever he goes, that is where the standard is set." Wang Wenliang, a Master Sergeant First Class and the Party member with the longest Party standing in the battalion, said with feeling.