Yu Qiuli

Yu Qiuli (; 15 November 1914 – 3 February 1999) was a Chinese Communist army officer and politician, general of the People's Liberation Army. A veteran of the Long March, he held top military and government positions under both Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping and is considered the founding father of the Chinese petroleum industry and the China National Petroleum Corporation.

Following military service as a senior commander and political commissar in the Second Sino–Japanese War and the Chinese Civil War, Yu then served as Minister of the Petroleum Industry (1958–1966), Chairman of the State Planning Commission (1970–1980), Vice Premier (1975–1982), and Deputy Secretary-General of the Central Military Commission as well as Director of the PLA General Political Department (in effect, responsible for ensuring the political loyalty of the entire PLA) from 1982 to 1987.

Daqing Oil Field Yu was in charge of the development of the Daqing oil field. During its 1960 construction as part of the Great Leap Forward, Yu mobilized workers building the Daqing oil field through ideological motivation instead of material incentives, focusing enthusiasm, energy, and resources to complete a rapid industrialization project.

Yu was involved in the February Countercurrent of 1967, an intra-party conflict in which a group of military leaders opposed the direction of the Cultural Revolution and the Gang of Four.

After the death of Mao in 1976, Yu was promoted to the Politburo. He was a member of what is commonly referred to as the "petroleum faction" or "petroleum group," a group of senior officials who advocated using the profits from petroleum exports to finance high technology imports from the West and Japan. These officials were essentially Stalinists in their economic thinking, favoring central planning and heavy industry - a strategy that clashed with that of the ascendant Deng. As Deng's political fortunes rose in the late 1970s, those of the petroleum faction waned. Yu was forced to make a self-criticism after the collapse of a Japanese-made oil rig in the Bohai Gulf in 1979, and in 1980 he was transferred from the chairmanship of the State Planning Commission to the less high-profile post of head of the State Energy Commission.

Political overseer of the PLA In 1982, however, Yu was back in uniform, as Deng named him Deputy Secretary-General of the Central Military Commission and Director of the PLA General Political Department, a position of massive influence in the PLA, being responsible for checking and ensuring the political reliability and loyalty of all military personnel, and often described as "Military Grand Inquisitor". Yu held these posts until 1987, when he retired.