# Hsu Li-nung

Hsu Li-nung (traditional Chinese: 許歷農; simplified Chinese: 许历农; pinyin: Xǔ Lìnóng; born 4 April 1919) is a military officer, politician and Chinese unification activist in the Republic of China. He was the Minister of Veterans Affairs Commission of the Executive Yuan from 1987 to 1993. He also served as a representative of the National University of China, the general convenor of the New Party League of the National University of China, the chairman of the Huang Fuxing Party Department of the Kuomintang, and the deputy chairman of the National Unification Council. National policy adviser to the Presidential Office, founding member of the New Party, principal of the Army Officer School, principal of the Political War School, and commander of the Sixth Army Corps.

## Biography
### Early and professional life

Hsu's father, Xu Sigong, once served as a civil servant in North China. He died of illness shortly after returning home due to illness in his middle age. Xu was six years old at the time, so he did not have a deep impression of his father. He had a brother and a sister, and their mother also died when Hsu was 12 years old. School has been his home since he was a child. He first attended Anqing No. 1 Middle School and then transferred to several schools before ending up at the United Middle School established in Zhide, Anhui. Tuition and living expenses were paid for by his grandfather Xu Qifen. He joined the army when the Marco Polo Bridge Incident broke out in 1937.
Graduated from the 16th Infantry Course of the Third Branch of the Army Academy. He served as the principal of the Army Academy, Commander of the Kinmen Defense Command, Director of the General Political Warfare Department of the Ministry of National Defense, Chairman of the Executive Yuan Retirement Committee, and Deputy Chairman of the National Unification Committee of the Presidential Office. Equal grade. In 1981, he served as the commander of the National Day parade and in 1982, he was promoted to the second-level general of the Army.
He once served as a member of the Central Standing Committee of the Kuomintang. He quit the party in 1993 due to his opposition to Lee Teng-hui, then President of the Republic of China and Chairman of the Chinese Kuomintang. Later, he participated in the founding of a new party and was expelled from the Kuomintang.
After Lien Chan became the chairman of the Kuomintang, Hsu, Lin Yanggang and Hao Baicun returned to the that party in 2005 and were appointed as chairman of the presidium of the Central Evaluation Committee of the Kuomintang.
Because he once formed a new party with Zhao Shaokang, Yu Muming, Wang Jianxuan, etc., and was elected as a representative of the third National Congress on behalf of the new party, he is known as the boss of the new party and is also known as "Father Hsu". He still has the status of consultant to the new party.

### Later life

Hsu has been committed to communicating with the Chinese Communist Party in recent years and serves as the president of the New Alliance to promote the national reunification of the Republic of China.
The New Alliance was founded in 1994 with the purpose of promoting the reunification of China. In 2005, Hsu stated in an interview with China Central Television that he supported socialism with Chinese characteristics proposed by Deng Xiaoping, the former leader of mainland China. Therefore, he did not agree with the reunification of China before 1979, but supported the reunification after 1979. Since 2007, it has organized visits to mainland China for retired Taiwanese generals. In 2010, the first Huangpu-Zhongshan Cross-Strait Sentiment Forum was held.
On 19 December 2013, the New Alliance, the New Party, the Association for the Promotion of Peaceful Reunification across the Taiwan Straits, the China Unification Alliance, the Association for the Promotion of Commercial and Industrial Unification, the Chinese Unification Promotion Party, the Workers’ Party, the Chinese National Unity Association, the Republic of China Association for Unity and Self-Strength, and the China Huangpu Sihai The "Joint Meeting of Political Groups Promoting the Peaceful Reunification of the Chinese Nation" composed of 15 groups including the Tongxin Hui, the Loyalty and Righteous Comrades Association of the Republic of China, the Qingtian Association of the Republic of China, the National Democratic Unification Association of China, the New Hongmen Party of China, and the Chinese Patriotic Tongxin Association was held at National Taiwan University A meeting was held in the Alumni Association Hall, chaired by Hsu, and a joint declaration was issued after the meeting to support cross-strait reunification.
On 26 September 2014, Hsu, as the president of the New Alliance and the chairman of the New Party Yu Muming, led the "Taiwan Peaceful Reunification Group Joint Visiting Delegation" to meet with Xi Jinping, the General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, at the Great Hall of the People, expressing his hope to see the reunification of China.
On 30 August 2015, Hsu was asked whether he would participate in the Chinese Communist Party's military parade to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the Anti-Japanese War. He responded: "As long as it does not violate the historical truth and methods, I agree to it wherever it can be held." He also explained that he had participated in military parades held in mainland China before. The commemoration of the 60th anniversary of the Anti-Japanese War was because there were no relevant activities in Taiwan at that time, and because "the front battlefield of the Anti-Japanese War was led by the Kuomintang, and the Communist Party fought behind enemy lines", he currently chose to participate in a series of activities organized by the government of the Republic of China in Taipei.
On 10 November 2016, Hsu went to Beijing to participate in the 7th "Zhongshan·Huangpu·Cross-Strait Sentiment" forum co-sponsored by the Central Committee of the Chinese Kuomintang Revolutionary Committee and the Huangpu Military Academy Alumni Association. He said, "The peaceful reunification of the two sides of the Taiwan Strait will inevitably come naturally. I hope that in our I can see the peaceful reunification of both sides of the Taiwan Strait in my lifetime." Then on November 11, he and 31 other retired generals of the National Army attended the "150th Anniversary of the Birth of Dr. Sun Yat-sen" held in the Great Hall of the People.
On 2 September 2017, Hsu published an open letter titled "The Truth from a 99-Year-Old Man", explaining the reasons why he no longer opposes the Communist Party in the past 10 years and is still committed to "promoting reunification." The letter pointed out that since Deng Xiaoping promoted "reform and opening up", mainland China has completely abandoned communism and has explored and found an effective plan for governing the country - socialism with Chinese characteristics. The letter lists the actions and achievements of socialism with Chinese characteristics, and believes that the thoughts and actions of mainland China today are fully in line with the principles of normal national development and are also beneficial to both sides of the Taiwan Strait. The reasons for anti-communism in the past have long since ceased to exist. As for "promoting reunification," the letter believes that reunification is the goal consistently pursued by the Constitution of the Republic of China. The slogans of the year such as "Counterattack on the Mainland," "Recover the Mainland's Land," and "Fight for the Survival and Development of the Republic of China" were all pursuit of national reunification. The specific proposition is that "Taiwan independence" is not only inappropriate subjectively (blood relationship, culture), but also objectively (relative situation) impossible.
On 30 June 2022, Hsu's first memoir biography was published.

## Personal life

Wang Jingrong, Hsu's first wife when he was in mainland China, and her father, Wang Helin, was Hsu's superior in the army. He was the director of the 25th Army of the National Revolutionary Army at that time. At that time, Wang Helin and Xu Linong's troops were stationed in Peiping, and Wang admired Xu Linong very much. He believes that Xu "will definitely become a great weapon". When Xu Linong was promoted to battalion commander, Wang Helin took the initiative to marry his daughter Wang Jingrong to Hsu. At that time, Wang Jingrong was only 16 years old and Hsu was 24 years old.
In 1949, when the civil war between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party worsened, Hsu and his wife left Peking with the Nationalist Army. He separated from his wife at the train station and promised to return to his hometown to reunite when the war was over. However, in the end, it backfired. Hsu never saw his first wife again. When Hsu went to Taiwan, his 3-month-old daughter Xu Qiyan was left in mainland China with her mother. Xu Qiyan lived with her maternal grandparents in Wuhan since she was a child. Her maternal grandmother later served as the people's representative of Wuchang. Xu Qiyan was taken home by her mother Wang Jingrong when she was seven years old. In order to make a living, Wang Jingrong remarried a worker named Zhang, and gave birth to a half-brother and sister to Xu Qiyan. They began to work in Wuhan. After the urban population was decentralized, the family moved to Tongshan one after another. Her stepfather named Zhang got a job as a caretaker. Working in a waste workshop, her mother performed odd jobs every day to make ends meet. Father and daughter Hsu Li-nung and Xu Qiyan did not reunite until cross-strait family visits were opened up.
More than ten years after Hsu arrived in Taiwan, he married Chen Qinghua. Chen was from Hubei and worked in life insurance at the Central Trust Bureau. The two had a daughter.