Listen — the Sound of Struggle from the Front Lines
— Selected Scripts from the "Strivers Speak" (奋斗者说) Strong-Army Story Sessions, Part of the "Strong-Army Style" (强军风采) Mass Cultural Activities
Stories are the vessel of the spirit. The march toward a strong army is inscribed with the footprints of struggle and filled with vivid stories that strike straight to the heart and spur people forward. Since the beginning of this year, units across the entire military have carefully organized "Strivers Speak" strong-army story sessions as part of the "Strong-Army Style" mass cultural activities, using the inspiring stories of exemplary figures close at hand to rally hearts and minds. The blazing practice of building a strong army has provided rich material for these story sessions. We will select and publish the best scripts to lead our readers deep into the front-line posts and feel the new spirit and new bearing of officers and soldiers striving to build a strong army. Units are warmly invited to submit contributions.
— The Editors
Always Be a "Steel Nail"
■ Sun Jiangtao
Profile: Sun Jiangtao, instructor at the Teaching and Research Section of the Training Base of the People's Armed Police (PAP) Hunan Corps, First-Class Staff Sergeant; named one of the 23rd "Top Ten Loyal Guards of the Chinese People's Armed Police"; awarded first-class merit citation once, second-class merit citation once, and third-class merit citation twice; recipient of the China Youth May Fourth Medal in 2026.
Sun Jiangtao
In the dead of night, I sometimes run my fingers over the scar on my wrist. It lies against my skin like a centipede — hard to the touch, with a steel nail beneath it.
During the corps special operations intensive training in 2014, I fell from a four-meter-high rope ladder and fractured my left hand when it hit the ground. The doctor said the bone had been set five times without success, and in the end the only option was to put in a steel nail. From that point on, my wrist joint had an uninvited guest.
Late at night, unable to sleep in the darkened ward, I suddenly recalled my years of martial arts training at the Shaolin Martial Arts Research Institute as a boy. Back then, we would hold a stance for half a shi (半个时辰) at a stretch. The master held a bamboo switch in his hand — if anyone's knees bent, it came down with a crack. Beads of sweat dripped from my chin to the floor, pooling into a small puddle.
"Only those who can stand firm can develop real skill!" Those words from my master entered my bones even earlier than the steel nail in my wrist.
Not long after I was discharged from the hospital, I heard that the corps special operations cadre and backbone intensive training was about to begin, and I insisted on taking part. When shooting, the rifle stock pressed against my shoulder socket and my left hand supported the handguard; every shot felt like someone striking my wrist with a hammer, the steel nail vibrating inside the bone. On the obstacle course, scaling the high wall required pushing off with both hands. I didn't dare use my left hand, and forced myself over using only my right hand and core strength.
First in tactics, first in combat, first in individual all-around… The day the results were posted, I stood before the notice board and smiled with satisfaction. My comrades called me the "Iron Man." I waved it off — I thought the assessment was too high. I am not made of iron; the pain in my wrist was real. I simply did not want a single injury to put me out of the ranks.
Standing firm takes strength, and it takes willpower.
When I first enlisted in 2011, my martial arts background let me stand out from the very start of basic training — I ran 3,000 meters in under eleven minutes on my first attempt, and picked up equipment training immediately. But afterward I was assigned to a garrison company with heavy sentry duties, and I let my training standards slip. In one assessment my results were unsatisfactory; I couldn't even keep up with the veterans on the run, and my fighting spirit collapsed. The squad leader pulled me aside and said: "You're already deflated after just a few days? Maybe you should just serve your two years and get out."
The squad leader had read the stubborn, competitive streak in my bones and deliberately threw cold water on me — a few words were enough to bring me back to my senses. I had practiced martial arts for so many years without giving up, and I had enlisted determined to be a good soldier. How could I just walk away?
In winter, after collective training ended, I would still hang from the pull-up bar, puffs of white breath rising from my mouth. I practiced low crawling in the snow until my hands swelled from the cold, but I didn't feel it as hardship.
In the next assessment, I again ranked near the top. The squad leader slapped my shoulder and called out: "Well done!" I have remembered that praise to this day. It was also from that time that I began to slowly understand — a good soldier has two sides: the sharp edge that charges forward to win, and the resilience that does not break under setbacks; even when knocked down, one always grits one's teeth and stands back up.
The New Year's Eve of my second year gave me an even deeper understanding of what it means to be a good soldier. At Mao Zedong Square in Shaoshan, we carried out security duties in full combat gear. As the midnight bell rang in the new year, fireworks burst overhead and ten thousand lights glittered before us. Cold wind poured down my collar; the white breath I exhaled frosted on my face mask. In the distance, people were counting down, people were cheering. In that moment, my heart was unusually calm, and for the first time I felt so clearly the weight of this uniform. Afterward, I often told new soldiers: What does loyalty look like? Sometimes, it looks like a soldier standing at his post — like a steel nail, driven into his battle station.
In 2015, I went abroad for the first time, traveling to Jordan to serve as an instructor. After passing through multiple rounds of selection, I represented the PAP in the coaching team, serving as a combat instructor.
During a training break, a foreign student came up to challenge me. He was half a head taller than me and had studied striking arts and judo overseas. He wore a smile at the corner of his mouth, his eyes full of defiance. His whip kick swept toward me with a rush of air. I spotted the opening, grabbed his right elbow, clamped my left leg around his neck in a cross-body armlock, and locked him down tight. He gritted his teeth and struggled a few times, his face flushing red, and finally tapped the mat — he conceded. As the applause broke out, I said to myself: I haven't brought shame to this uniform.
In 2017, my old wrist injury flared up repeatedly. The doctor looked at the scans, was silent for a moment, then said: "If this keeps up, the hand will be finished…" That day, walking out of the hospital, I stood at the entrance for a long time; the steel nail in my wrist felt heavier than it ever had. I fell into confusion: what is left for a special operations soldier who cannot put force through his hand?
At that moment, my old squad leader's words woke me up: "If you can't be a special operations soldier, you can become an instructor and teach your skills to others."
A nail can hold a broken bone together, but it cannot hold me up when I am sinking. I had to hold myself up. If I could not be the "sharp blade" charging into battle, then I would be the "iron hammer" that forges the sharp blade. In September 2017, after completing my overseas instruction assignment and returning home, I transferred to the PAP Hunan Corps Training Base and took up a post as an instructor.
When I first started leading a squad, I trained hard myself, but the squad's results were a mess. One soldier had poor physical fitness and failed the five-kilometer armed cross-country run. Some said his foundation was too weak to work with. I refused to believe there was a soldier who couldn't be brought along. I carefully drew up a training plan for him and trained alongside him every day. When we ran, if he wanted to stop, I pushed him forward. After countless five-kilometer runs — I lost count of how many — on the day of the final assessment, he finally achieved an "excellent" rating. After crossing the finish line, he crouched on the ground, weeping with joy, and said to me: "Squad leader, I didn't let you down!"
In that moment, my eyes grew hot too. I said nothing — I just patted his shoulder, the same way my squad leader had once patted mine.
Occasionally a new soldier asks me how I got through all these years. I hold out my left hand for them to see and tell them: when a bone breaks, a nail can hold it together; as long as a person has that drive inside, there is no obstacle that cannot be overcome!
(Compiled by Deng Xin and Song Hengye)
My "Blue Helmet" Journey
■ Zhou Juan
Profile: Zhou Juan, head nurse of the Special Services Section at the 960th Hospital of the Joint Logistic Support Force; delegate to the 13th National Congress of Chinese Women; awarded the United Nations "Medal of Honor for Peace" three times; awarded third-class merit citation three times.
Zhou Juan (first from right)
When people speak of female peacekeeping soldiers, they often bestow the flattering titles of "angel" or "rose," as if beneath that blue helmet there glows a layer of romantic soft light. Over ten years, I have worn the blue helmet three times to carry out peacekeeping missions. For me, that shade of blue is more like the deep sea — the more still it is, the more awe-inspiring.
In July 2013, I went abroad for the first time, accompanying a peacekeeping medical team to the South Sudan mission area. On the very first night, no sooner had the lights-out call sounded than dense gunfire and artillery erupted in the distance. In that moment, I truly felt that I was in a real battlefield and sensed the unknown dangers lurking there.
"Beep —" The first time I received a gunshot-wound patient, the shrill alarm of the monitor suddenly sounded, and the patient's pupils were slowly dilating. I drew a deep breath, pressed down the fear and revulsion surging up inside me, and had only one thought in my mind: faster, faster. My comrades and I worked continuously for eight hours, moving back and forth through the ward, making emergency interventions. When the patient's vital signs finally stabilized and our taut nerves suddenly relaxed, I realized my legs had gone weak and my feet felt as though they were treading on cotton.
Through one increasingly dangerous and urgent rescue mission after another, I gradually came to understand: within this military uniform and white coat there is a kind of strength that can press down all the fear in one's heart and make us act without regard for anything else.
When I returned from South Sudan, I thought that experience would slowly fade, but instead it took root in my heart, often waking me in the night, making me hear the moans of patients across the artillery fire. So when the second peacekeeping mission came, I volunteered to go to the more arduous Mali. Some people didn't understand: "Haven't you already gone once?" But I knew that precisely because I had been through the baptism of war, I better understood the value of a veteran in the field.
When I set foot on Malian soil, I planted a small, unremarkable seedling with my own hands in a corner of the camp. I never expected that when I set foot on Malian soil a second time, it had withstood the raging sandstorms of the Sahara and, in the gaps between the artillery fire, had put out branches and leaves, growing into a "tree of peace" bearing witness to Sino-African friendship. Every time I gaze at it, I think of those days of wresting lives from war and disease.
In November 2023, a pre-dawn race against death. A civilian peacekeeper with the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) suddenly developed severe chest pain and was rushed to our hospital. He had been in continuous pain for nearly an hour, drenched in sweat, breathing rapidly; the vessel had to be opened as quickly as possible. But the hospital lacked the conditions for interventional surgery, and transferring the patient to the capital Bamako would take more than two hours at the fastest — there simply was not enough time.
The patient's condition was the order! While reporting to our superiors, we immediately began thrombolytic therapy. Oxygen, cardiac monitoring, intravenous infusion… One hour passed with no sign of improvement. A look of despair gradually spread across the patient's face; trembling, he picked up his phone and began recording a video while weeping. I could not understand what he was saying, but I understood — he was leaving a final message for his family far away.
Every tiny fluctuation on the monitor gripped our hearts. Fortunately, the thrombolytic drugs finally took effect. The patient's chest pain gradually eased, and the electrocardiogram curve became strong and smooth again — the vessel was open. I wept with joy. A few days later, the MINUSMA Senior Medical Officer sent a special email highly praising the Chinese hospital's professional competence and humanitarian spirit, and conveying the patient's sincere gratitude.
Three peacekeeping tours, from South Sudan to Mali, from my thirties to my forties. Every time I went on a peacekeeping mission, my family was always very worried, yet they still gave me great support. On that unfamiliar land, I often missed my family, but once I was busy, all those longings were pressed down in my heart. I never dared to relax for a single moment — afraid that one instant of slackness might let a life that should have been saved slip through my hands; afraid that the glory of China's peacekeeping forces might be tarnished by a single mistake of mine…
Over 480 peacekeeping days and nights, the supplies and data I handled numbered in the tens of millions; every item of consumables handed over, every one of the more than 3,000 bilingual forms I filled out — not a single error. When MINUSMA officials came to offer condolences, they saw the supplies I had organized and arranged, and gave me a thumbs-up. Later, MINUSMA produced and broadcast a special video showing a day in my working life at the hospital, which received widespread praise from viewers online. China's Ambassador to the United Nations commented at a meeting: this video fully promoted the positive image of United Nations peacekeeping operations. This was not a showcase of me alone — I was only one representative among many. To be able to strive together with a group of like-minded comrades in a foreign land on behalf of the nation, to show the international community "Chinese standards" and display the image of the Chinese soldier — I feel boundlessly fortunate.
Over the years I have received some honors, but what I treasure most is not the flowers and applause. It is the sense of solid satisfaction that wells up in my heart each time a patient gives a thumbs-up and says "China is great" after a successful treatment.
Now I have come to the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau to carry out medical assistance work in Tibet. The cold winds of the plateau are utterly unlike the blazing sun of Africa, but the tempering that comes from a harsh environment is no lighter. Yet wherever I am, my reverence for life and my fulfillment of my mission have never changed. I treat every medical patrol as a sortie, checking the first-aid kit again and again before setting out. From African soil to the snow-covered plateau, what changes is the latitude and longitude; what does not change is my original aspiration to "don white and take up arms, and march toward battle" (白衣执甲、向战而行).
Whenever the order comes, I will still shoulder my pack and walk into any battlefield that needs me, striving to be that battle-field rose that blooms quietly and stands firm against the wind.
(Compiled by Xu Jianfu and Liu Bin)
Precision in the Confined Space, the Course Stretches Far
■ Wang Qilin
Profile: Wang Qilin, helmsman-signalman technician aboard a Navy submarine, First-Class Master Sergeant; awarded second-class merit citation once and third-class merit citation twice.
Wang Qilin
In most people's eyes, the deep sea is a mysterious and romantic world. But for a submarine helmsman-signalman, beneath that dark blue there is no scenery — only the numbers jumping on the instrument panel and the heavy responsibility on one's shoulders. This is the battle station that controls the submarine's course and depth, and it is the bond that ties me tightly to the deep sea of the motherland.
It was a long-distance navigation exercise many years ago. That night the wind and waves were fierce; not long after the submarine left port, it ran into an underwater current. The submarine rocked from side to side, and a wave of dizziness hit instantly. I clenched my teeth, concentrated completely, and held the submarine on the prescribed heading. Just as the submarine was about to clear the current zone, the helmsman beside me noticed something wrong: "The compass needle has failed — the log reading is dropping fast!"
I tried to put the helm hard over to come around, but the rudder angle did not change at all. At that moment, a thought that made me tense surfaced in my mind: the submarine had been caught in a fishing net!
A fishing net in the deep sea is an "invisible killer" that submarines dread encountering. Once entangled, at best it damages the propeller; at worst it leaves the submarine without power, trapped on the seabed.
"Captain, report! The stern propeller is suspected of being fouled in a fishing net!" I drew a deep breath and pressed down the thunderclap in my chest. I knew full well that every second at that moment bore on the safety of the entire boat, and any panic would be fatal.
"Flood the buoyancy trim tanks!" "Ahead full, right full rudder!" Orders rang out one after another in the compartment. I gripped the helm wheel tightly with both hands, mentally retracing the submarine's track and the direction of the current to judge where the net was fouled, while at the same time executing the captain's orders — trying to use the force of the current, combined with the boat's turning, to tear an opening in the net.
As the helm wheel turned, a sharp snapping sound came from beneath the hull. My eyes lit up — that was the sound of the net breaking! I seized that fleeting opportunity without hesitation and rapidly adjusted the submarine's attitude. The submarine slid smoothly forward, like a deep-sea leviathan breaking free of its bonds.
"Heading restored to normal!" The young helmsman's voice was full of excitement. Only then did my taut nerves finally relax, and I realized my back was already soaked through with sweat.
That heart-stopping escape once again confirmed the saying: in the deep sea, details are the boundary between life and death.
Over the years, young helmsmen have often asked me: "Why can your hands stay so steady even in a crisis?" I tell them: "The submarine is our home. You have to get to know every valve and pipe, and understand its 'temperament' (脾气) in different sea states." This is pressed out second by second over time. Behind every precise dive and ascent, every effort to maintain "zero depth deviation" (深度差零) in surging swells, lie tens of thousands of tedious and rigorous training repetitions.
On the eve of a major mission, an expert proposed that, to raise the mission standard, the submarine's depth deviation should be controlled within 0.5 meters. Anyone familiar with submarines knows that the underwater environment is complex and ever-changing; controlling a behemoth of several thousand tons with such precision is no easy matter.
"We can try!" Facing the challenge, I did not hesitate. In the sea training that followed, I always brought a video camera specifically to record my own operating movements. After returning to port, I played the footage frame by frame and studied it repeatedly. "This rudder angle was too small," "This time the rudder correction was too late"… I recorded every detail in my notebook and engraved it in my mind.
On the day of the mission, I locked my eyes on the depth gauge, gripped the helm wheel with both hands, and reported immediately upon reaching the prescribed depth, successfully completing the mission: I not only held the depth deviation within 0.1 meters, but also reduced the heading deviation to nearly half the target figure that had been set in advance.
Precision in the confined space, the course stretches far. Thirty years have flowed by in silence, like deep-sea currents. From the breath-holding concentration of my early days facing complex sea states, to the calm composure of today, knowing the submarine's every temperament intimately — my hands have long since become one with this confined helm wheel. This silent track is the heartfelt declaration I have written to the deep blue ocean and to the great motherland.
(Compiled by Guo Zhengyang)
Releasing "Eagles" on the Grassland
■ Zhang Huru
Profile: Zhang Huru, Third-Class Master Sergeant in an Army unit; awarded third-class merit citation for national defense science and technology once; holder of six national patents.
Zhang Huru
The wind of the grassland is the true master here. It is nothing like the gentle, soft breezes of ordinary waterways and forests. This wind is hard and stubborn, blowing tirelessly year-round, carrying the scent of grass clippings and sand. Our small position, like a solitary stone on an endless green carpet, is often set slightly trembling by the wind here.
My work, like this wind, has a hard, unyielding quality. Others say we are "eagle handlers" — responsible for launching target drones, providing aerial targets specifically for air defense weapons and equipment trials.
My "eagle" lies quietly on the tow vehicle right now. It has none of the wild spirit and agility of a grassland eagle; it is gray-white all over, its contours clean and clear, looking more like a stone polished by wind and sand, or an unsharpened blunt sword. Its mission, from the moment of its creation, is to be "destroyed."
I walk a circle around it, fingers brushing the cold fuselage, checking every screw. Connecting cables, calibrating — every action has been repeated thousands of times, as familiar as breathing. Finally, I pat its "shoulder." That cold metal shell seems to be bidding me a silent farewell.
"Partner, today it's all up to you."
The launch order is given. The booster suddenly spews a blazing white flame, and the tremendous roar drowns out the wind. It breaks free of the earth, trailing a plume of exhaust as it surges toward the blue sky. Soon it becomes a small black dot, and under my control it begins to weave and soar across that blue backdrop along the carefully designed flight path.
An aerial contest begins. I stare intently at the screen, where its altitude, speed, and bearing flash and jump. My fingers move across the buttons of the remote controller, sending it flight commands, making it simulate the flight attitude of an enemy aircraft. It is like a solitary dancer on a vast stage, performing a story of tragic grandeur.
"Prepare to fire!" Hearing the sound from the intercom, my heart tightens slightly. On the distant horizon, a pinpoint of light suddenly blazes, then stretches into a white arc, and with a coldness of absolute precision, it drives toward my target drone.
This is a contest measured in seconds. I issue rapid commands, immediately releasing all the decoy flares in an attempt to create interference. In that moment, I feel as if I myself am sitting in that target drone, enduring enormous g-forces, the air squeezed violently from my lungs, watching that white light draw closer and closer, closer and closer…
A thunderous boom echoes across the sky, and the point of light on the screen vanishes in an instant. Outside the window, a small puff of smoke hangs against the deep blue backdrop — the trace left by the "eagle" I released. I let go of the control stick and look at that patch of sky — it was just there, burning fiercely, and then it scattered cleanly and completely.
The mission over, I slowly uncurl my fingers, which have gone white from gripping, and exhale a long breath. Countless days and nights of painstaking research, thousands of rehearsals of flight paths and parameters — all for this moment of real-world testing of weapons and equipment combat capability.
Walking out of the shelter, the long wind of the grassland instantly envelops me, still that fierce, hard, tenacious gust. In the distance, the horizon is soaked in the last light of the setting sun, spreading a warm, deep copper-red. Several comrades bend their heads to sort out equipment, talking about the scene of the missile hitting the target drone, their voices calm and relaxed, carrying the quiet ease that comes after a mission is complete.
Day after day the north wind sweeps tirelessly across the grassland; so too are we — rooted in this open wilderness, cycling back and forth between the workshop and the test range, content to be a silent whetstone, so that the sharp sword guarding ten thousand li of sky may be honed ever keener.
Night gradually closes in, and scattered lights flicker to life in the distance. Tomorrow, new "eagles" will be sent skyward by us, and new "eagle hunters" will come slicing through the air. We brushed the dust from our clothes and walked toward those lights.
(Compiled by Zhao Xian)
Photo credits: Liu Bin, Guo Zhengyang, Sun Yifan, Zhao Xian
Layout design: Wang Feng