Luo Ruiqing (; May 31, 1906 – August 3, 1978), formerly romanized as Lo Jui-ch'ing, was a Chinese army officer and politician, general of the People's Liberation Army. As the first Minister of Public Security from 1949 to 1959, he established the security and police apparatus of the People's Republic of China after the Communist victory in the civil war, and then served as the Chief of the Joint Staff from 1959 to 1965, achieving military victory in the Sino-Indian War. Despite being a close associate and supporter of Mao Zedong for decades, Luo was targeted, purged, and severely beaten during the Cultural Revolution, which he opposed from the beginning. Biography Luo Ruiqing was born in Nanchong, Sichuan in 1906 and joined the Chinese Communist Party in 1928 at the age of 22. He was the eldest son of a wealthy landlord named Luo Chunting (罗春庭), who had a total of six children. However, Luo Chunting was an opium addict and lost all his wealth due to his addiction, and the entire family had to rely on Luo Ruiqing's mother, who left no first name, but only her surname Xian (鲜). Despite the decline in family wealth, Luo's family was still able to afford the large sum of money needed for his education, and this fact was used by the Red Guards to attack Luo during the Cultural Revolution. Luo's early life was deliberately ignored in official Chinese records until the 1990s because his petty bourgeois background did not fit into the political environment until the end of the 20th century. Luo participated in the Long March and held several security posts in the People's Liberation Army. He was transferred to Shaanxi to oversee the training of young cadres. He led several purges of supporters of former General Secretary Wang Ming. He was then put in charge of eliminating the faction loyal to Zhang Guotao, Mao Zedong's rival in the Fourth Front Army, shortly after his political defeat. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, Luo was appointed Minister of Public Security and a member of the Central Military Commission. As such, he was responsible for consolidating the new system against its internal enemies; in 1950, at a conference in Beijing, he supported the establishment of a paramilitary force under his ministry, similar to the Soviet MVD. Luo fought in the Korean War from 1950 to 1953. In