In 1976, there was a terrible earthquake in Tangshan, hundreds of thousands of lives were lost.
In the same year, the CCP's three big guns, Zhou En-lai, Zhu De, and Mao Ze Dong died one after another.
In Sept., soon after Mao died, Ye Jianying went against what Mao asked of him before his death and collaborated with Wang Dong-xing, and Hua Guofeng, and initiated coup d'état
Jiang Ze-min turned fifty, in that year.
Vice-CHairman of the CCP, Wang Hong-wen, member of the Standing Committee of the Politburo, Zhang Chunqiao, members of the Politburo of the CCP Central Committee, Jiang Qing, and Yao Wen Yuan, the so-called "Gang Of Four", were arrested.
Though Jiang Qing was Mao's widow, she was, even before Mao's corpus turned cold, made a political prisoner, along with nephew Mao Yuanxin.
The perpetrators did so under the auspices of following Mao's political lines.
It was illustrated of the saying, no CCP leader has a good ending.
Shanghai had been the Gang Of Four's home turf by that time.
In order to control Shanghai more effectively, a central working group was sent in.
Since Jiang Ze-min had worked in Shanghai before, he was temporarily made a member of the working group and accompanied the group to Shanghai.
When the working group entered Shanghai, the military force there, who numbered more than 30 thousand, were ordered to ride in a few hundred vehicles and marched throughout the city.
They shouted in unison: "Overthrow the Gang Of Four!"
Driven by college students, the long-oppressed Shanghai people took to the streets and cheered the overthrow of the Gang of Four.
Jiang Ze-min was overwhelmed by the welcome that the central working group received from the people of Shanghai.
Before long, the working group was no longer needed.
Jiang Ze-min reluctantly returned to Beijing and resumed his office as director of the Foreign Affairs Bureau in the First Ministry of Machinery Industry.
He had got something of a high, from the experience in the working group of the Central Committee, the sense of power, he felt like a regal delegate, and the satisfaction, of having everyone asked for his approval.
Jiang Ze-min was determined to continue to rise through the ranks.
Jiang Ze-min didn't place his bet right every time though.
In 1978 Jiang Ze-min hedged a wrong bet.
He didn't expect Deng Xiao-ping to return to power, because he had made speeches, that strongly criticized Deng Xiao-ping, during the Criticize Deng, and Fight the Rightists' Reversal Attempts Movement in 1975.
He almost was categorized as one of the three kinds of people, a stinging label, that would spell political downfall.
His political career met with obstacles.
In 1979, the central leadership formed a state administration, on import and export affairs, and a state administration, on foreign investments, both chaired by Gu Mu.
Wang Daohan was one of the vice chairmen.
In 1980, Wang Daohan was appointed Mayor of Shanghai.
He strongly...
