Qiu Heng

Qiu Heng (May 16 1896-July 18 1964) was a Daxian military officer and politician who served as the second president of the Republic of Daxia from 1951 to 1964; succeeding his old comrade and superior, General Dai Hanjian. Qiu Heng was a recipient of several military awards throught his career including the highest attainable existing one, the Medal of the Republic. He joined the army in 1913 and rose through the ranks, participating in the 1918 suppression of the Liyuan peasant uprising and serving in Rusana during the Al-Dukir War. During the Second Great War he commanded Daxian land forces during the Battle of Ayermer (1936) and became a national figure after its successful conclusion. The disappointing lack of progress on other Daxian fronts and the unchecked popular growth of socialism under the indolent gaze of Emperor Hongli led him to side with his friend Dai Hanjian and together they overthrew the imperial system during the Glorious Revolt; he became second in command of the military junta that was formed to rule the nation.

In 1944 he was promoted to Chieft of Staff of the armed forces and oversaw the rebuilding and expansion of Daxia's military might, and moved its doctrines towards a combined arms approach. As head of the military he supported Lixin Ji's push for the creation of the State Atomic Commission to spearhead the development of a nuclear weapons program. As president he guided the transition from a purely military regime to a hybrid one with the creation of the National Reconstruction Front and extended the latters political dominance and networks of patronage to cover most productive sectors. A lifelong opponent of socialist thought, he fiercely persecuted and jailed leftists throught his tenure, forcing the Communist Party of Daxia back underground. In 1962 he orchestrated the Daxian intervention in the long running Rusani Civil War known as the Little Incursion that swung the battlefield fortunes of the NCDP and allowed it to prevail by 1963. During the last months of his life he progressively forced the devastated Rusana into a subordinate position within Daxia's sphere of influence. He died in 1964 due to complications of leukemia.

Qiu Heng is a divisive figure in modern Daxia, on one hand he is celebrated for his many noteworthy military achievements, for strengthening Daxia's military capacities and for beginning the work of restoring the nation's place at the center of Audonia's power politics. On the other hand his detractors point to him as the principal architect of a repressive system that grew too sluggish and dysfunctional to keep up in the modern world and could only respond with brutality. He is vilified in Western sources especially for his mistreatment of prisoners of war and for the wholesale expulsion of Levantians from Ayermer.

Early life
On May 16 1896, Qiu Heng was born in the village of Quyang (曲阳) to a family of poor peasant farmers. Quyang and the wider province was going through a severe drought at the time so his family moved southeast to Xuhai in order to find work in that city. The family settled in the impoverished Wugou neighborhood, Qiu was enrolled in a local school while his parents found work as factory laborers. It was at this neighborhood school where Qiu met his lifelong friend Dai Hanjian, another student of peasant background. His father died falling from a construction scaffold when Qiu was seven and the family sunk deeper into poverty. Social advancement seemed impossible, except through the army; as luck would have it one of Dai Hanjian's maternal uncles was a lieutenant who helped the both of them be accepted into Zhaozou Military Academy when they reached 17.

Early military service
Upon graduation in 1917 from the academy with high honors, Heng was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant. He was assigned to the lead a platoon as part of the 2nd artillery batallion based at Taiqiu near the border with Lakdu. In 1918 his batallion was called into action alongside the rest of the of the 11th artillery regiment in suppressing an armed peasant uprising in Liyuan. Heng demonstrated quick thinking and bravery under fire and his unit served well in the seven months it took to defeat the peasant movement. He received two battlefield promotions to captain, one officer was killed in action and the other one reportedly fell down a set of stairs while drunk and broke his neck. Now leading his own artillery company he was sent in 1920 to the Emirate of Lakdu as part of the forces sent in support of Emir Abdul Razik who was battling the Al-Dukir tribe. With Barpubad's support the Al-Dukir tribal chiefs sought to overthrow Abdul Razik and put one of their own as emir; Razik however was a Qian client and secured the court's support through a large monetary bribe. The war to defeat the Al-Dukirs was brutal and devolved into guerrilla warfare as the tribesmen fought as irregulars and their forces blended very well with the populace. The Al-Dukirs were defeated in 1922 after their last stronghold near the Barpubad border was reduced to rubble by Daxian batteries. Qiu Heng secured an appointment as adjutant to Daxia's military attache to the court of Lakdu where he stayed until 1926. His experiences in southern Rusana would be very helpful to Qiu Heng thirty years later when he organized the Little Incursion. On his return to Daxia he married a cousin of his friend Dai Hanjian, cementing an alliance between the two men that would serve him well in later years.

Second Great War
The outbreak of the Second Great War did not take the imperial government by surprise, a general conflagration in Sarpedon was expected from a revanchist Caphiria. Starting in 1936 the Daxian government joined efforts to cobble together the National-Continental Co-Belligerency League with a strong emphasis on pushing Burgundie out of the continent for good. Daxia's first focus was the liberation of the island of Ayermer, an island close to the mainland that had been occupied by Burgundie for two hundred years that the Qian saw as a sword aimed at them. By this time Qiu Heng was one of the youngest generals in the army, thanks in part to connections made during his service in Rusana and the patronage of General Dai Ju, one of the strong men of the Qian army establishment. An operation was meticulously planned to take Ayermer in the autumn to coincide with a number of uprisings in Burgundie's colonies across the continent that would draw up their resources and attention. Qiu Heng was selected by high command to take charge of the ground elements involved in the operation, some seventy thousand men divided in four divisions and one volunteer Zaclarian brigade. Daxia declared war on the 28 of september of 1934 and the attack on the island began early the next day. A blockade of the island by a Daxian squadron proceeded for roughly a month but was forced to withdraw after under attack by a larger Burgoignesc fleet coming from Umardwal. The arrival of the Harmonious Flotilla Invincible swung the naval battle in favor of Daxia again, blockading the island for good and allowing ground operations to finally begin.

Landings began in October and fierce fighting ensued, the hilly jungle terrain favoring the defenders who also possessed a vast network of defensive tunnels. The greatest casualties for the Daxians was assaulting the intricate underground network; Qiu Heng gave draconian orders that anyone caught inside a tunnel was giving up their right to surrender, soldiers and civilians alike. On February 1935 finally all resistance was extinguished with over 2,500 dead and 37,000 captured Bergendii. These prisoners of war were interned on camps on the mainland as was the entire population of the island. The victory during the Battle of Ayermer favorably boosted Qiu Heng's reputation with the public and imperial court. He was wary however feasibility of the plans made to invade Pukhgundi and avoided taking a command in the offensive to avoid a dent to his newfound popularity should it go badly. He went on medical leave ostensibly to deal with complications from early stage leukemia but he possibly made the affliction up. The Pukhgundi offensive went surprisingly well for Daxia, with enemy forces pushed out the capital Sarkar and of most of the country after that, falling back to a defensive line on the southwestern peninsula. Qiu Heng requested and was granted command of a divisional force and participated in operations to brech the defensive lines, efforts which were ultimately thwarted. On November 1935 Qiu Heng's command post was targeted by artillery, he survived the attack but was left with shrapnel lodged on his left leg which caused him to limp and require a cane for the rest of his life; this incident put an effective end to Qiu Heng's service during the war and began his involvement in politics.

Glorious Revolt and Republic
Qiu Heng ended the war with the rank of full general, as did his friend and colleague Dai Hanjian who was one of the main planners and executors of the offensives in west Audonia and the Caldera operation. He was made chief of staff of the land forces one year after the end of hostilities, both to to install someone seen as a monarchist and to restore the confidence of the army in the leadership. Both him and his colleague Dai Hanjian them believed the home front had been badly neglected by the imperial government and the drug addled emperor Hongli. They especially disliked the growing popularity of democratic and socialist movements and their demands for a liberalization of the political system. To many in the military, the imperial system and bureaucracy had stopped being a guarantee of stability and transformed into a liability that stood in the way of dealing with internal agitators.

The two officers created a secret society named the Lodge of the Righteous Serpents to gather like minded officers and overthrow the Imperial system and replace it with a military dictatorship. On December 16th tank columns aligned with the lodge entered the capital from all sides while squads of soldiers went took over ministries.Other groups went to the houses of ministers to arrest them, the minister of defense was shot and killed after he tried to resist his captors. Qiu Heng himself led the takeover of the imperial palace and the capture of Hongli, forcing the imperial guards to surrender or the emperor and his family would be executed once the palace was inevitably taken. The coup was carried out in two hours and resulted in minimal casualties on both sides, stemming from the element of complete surprise achieved by the putschists and unwillingness on the part of many soldiers to defend the failing monarchy. An ecstatic Dai Hanjian took to the airwaves and announced the Glorious Revolt had succeeded and the era of dynastic rule had come to a definitive end; he declared the formation of the Committee of National Restoration that would lead the country with himself as its head and Qiu Heng as his deputy.

Deputy junta leader
The junta moved quickly to assert its authority and shore up popular support; a line up of technocratic ministers were appointed to replace the old dynasty loyal bureaucrats and the Emperor was made to officially abdicate the throne and renounced the Heavenly Mandate before being put under house arrest until 1948 when he died of complications of diabetes; his teenage son and heir died soon after in unclear circumstances. Hongli's royal consort, Princess Keuto of Metzetta was allowed to depart back to her homeland with two of the emperor's daughters. Many other members of the former imperial family were either put in prison, work camps or sent into exile to Metzetta or Yueguo. A referendum was organized asking the population if it agreed with the junta's capture of power and despite reported instances of pressuring people into voting, threats of violence and transporting people from rural areas on military buses to voting booths the result was overwhelmingly positive with an approval of 86%.

This period is where the political qualities of Qiu Heng first began to rise to the surface, while Dai Hanjian was the public leader and face of the junta and was fairly charismatic, Heng was the real operator behind the scenes. Ambitious officers soon began to be sidelined from the ranks of the junta, some were arrested after being accused of plotting a countercoup or of missappropiating army supplies; by 1948 out of ten military zones, eight were commanded by people considered to be part of Qiu Heng's political clique. If Dai had any misgivings about the growing influence of his friend he gave no indication in public or private conversation that survives; he gave the post of Minister of Defense to Qiu in 1949 and allowed him to staff its structure as he saw fit. Shortly after Qiu began speaking of setting up a political structure to gain more legitimacy in the eyes of influential Western nations, whose financial help might be needed to continue army expansion. The junta leader seemingly disagreed with these notions and intimated that he would get the job done and if necessary would stay on the job for twenty years. The insinuation of quasi imperial ruling for life was not lost on Qiu Heng who may have begun quiet preparations to oust Dai, or perhaps have him assasinated. According to medical records Dai Hanjian fell gravely ill from a bladder infection of worrisome intensity. Despite all attempts to save his life, the junta leader died on December 12 1951 at the age of 56. Authors critical of Qiu Heng suggest he had Dai poisoned with arsenic to get him out of the way of political reforms and stop his succession plan which may not have included Qiu in it anymore; no conclusive evidence has ever been found to corroborate this accusation. As deputy leader of the Committee of National Restoration, Qiu was sworn in two days later as leader of the junta and the country.

National Reconstruction Front
Qiu Heng's ascended to the leadership of the country with his mind set on normalizing the political situation, he saw the perpetuation of the military junta system as inherently unstable, absent an electoral mandate of sorts, any general in charge of a division could see feel themselves justified in attempting to take power the same way as the junta did in the first place. Since Qiu distrusted the established but outlawed old political parties, he decided instead to build a new party from the ground up. As a base he chose a pro-military civic association called the National Daxian Rally-NDR that had existed since 1945 but had never reached much relevance. Qiu directed the Ministry of Social Services and the Ministry of Finance to direct significant financial resources to the NDR to support its growth. The junta leader himself joined the NDR in the summer of 1952 and was elected its leader 'by acclamation' of the party delegates. This was followed by a massive bump in party membership as government employees joined en masse(to curry favor, preserve their jobs or genuine agreement) and trade unions and government contractors enjoined their affiliates and employees to do the same. In this early stage the biggest labor union of the country, the then All-Daxian Workers Central Union negotiated generous terms on collective bargaining and perks for its members in exchange for its unrestricted support for the new political machinery. Qiu Heng announced the first national elections for President and a new National Assembly would take place concurrently in mid 1952, he also announced his candidacy at the head of the now renamed National Reconstruction Front-NRF. To contest in these elections, Qiu's junta released the leaders of the Daxian Liberal Party, while of the more popular communist cadres only a handful were released. The campaigning was anything but fair, opposition events were routinely cancelled or when they went ahead they were not televised or were broken up by thugs. Several campaign aides of the communist party were assasinated. The NRF campaigned mainly on a platform of nationalist xenophobia; its political rivals were painted as Bergendii with Daxian faces, foreigner lovers and traitorous internationalists willing to sacrifice the Daxian people in exchange for utopias being created abroad. On economics the party swung hard towards economic protectionism with policies such as the creation of nationally owned companies on strategic sectors like oil to massively employ people.