Article on China's party Central Committee's care, concern for strategic missile.

(From BBC Monitoring International Reports)

Text of article by Xinhua reporters Cao Zhi and Zhang Xuanjie and Renmin Ribao reporter Fang Chunmei, entitled: "Temper China's sky-reaching sword - chronicles of the party Central Committee's concern for the building of strategic missile units", carried by official Chinese news agency Xinhua (New China News Agency); subheadings, ellipses as carried

Beijing, 2 July: China's strategic missile units have gone through 40 years of a magnificent course of development.

From the organization and establishment of the first ground-to-ground guided missile unit to the launching of the first strategic missile; from the first successful launching of an intercontinental ballistic missile to the formation of China's first strategic nuclear force; and from the establishment of the first new-type missile unit to the successful performance of conventional missiles in a military exercise... The Second Artillery Corps has in the main formed a weaponry system with both nuclear and conventional forces, connected firing ranges, and significantly strengthened power and effectiveness. It is playing an increasingly important role in reducing the danger of war, protecting national security, and defending world peace.

Recalling the marching course of the past 40 years, officers and soldiers of the missile units have a common feeling: The growth and progress of the strategic missile units are the embodiment of the earnest concern of the party Central Committee and the Central Military Commission.

Party Central Committee made resolute policy decision in face of "nuclear blackmail"

When the former Soviet Union detonated its first atomic bomb, New China's leaders had just selected Beijing as the capital. The newborn China was healing the wounds of war but the nuclear arms race had already erupted like a storm in the world.

At Fangze Garden of Zhongnanhai in early spring of 1955, Comrade Mao Zedong, after reading confidential materials on "nuclear blackmail" against China and the socialist camp in the East by imperialism, spoke to Comrade Zhou Enlai: "Without an atomic bomb, no one will listen to our words!"

People still can remember that during the Korean War, Commander-in-Chief of the "United Nations Forces" MacArthur had made naked "nuclear blackmail" on "dropping several atomic bombs in China's Northeast."

Leaders of New China, who had endured the bitterness of war, deeply realized that China wanted peace but peace would require protection.

In April 1955, Comrade Mao Zedong solemnly announced at an enlarged meeting of the …