Trần Đăng Ninh

Did You Know?

• Trần Đăng Ninh was born as Nguyễn Tuấn Đáng in 1910 in the hamlet of Quảng Nguyên, Quảng Phú Cầu commune, Ứng Hòa District.
• He accompanied Hồ Chí Minh on a secret mission to China in 1950 to establish diplomatic relations and request China's support.
• During 1952–1953 he developed the supply policy of 'mobilize logistics in place', reducing food consumption and transport labor.

Party work and generalship

Trần Đăng Ninh was drawn to Marxist revolutionary ideals and entered the Indochinese Communist Party in 1936. By 1939 he had become a member of the Party's Hanoi Committee, and the following year he joined the Northern Party Committee. He took part in the 7th Conference of the Central Committee in November 1940. At the 8th Conference of the Central Committee, held in a forest near Pác Bó in May 1941, he was elected an alternate member of the Central Committee. In July 1941 he assumed the role of Secretary of the Northern Party Committee. Later that year, Vichy French authorities arrested him and sentenced him to twenty years in prison. He was initially held at Hỏa Lò Prison in Hanoi, but because he was considered a problem prisoner, he was transferred to Son La Prison at the end of 1942. While there, he engaged in the Party's secret prison organization, helping to provide political and military training to political prisoners. In March 1943 he escaped from Son La Prison together with Nguyễn Lương Bằng, Nguyễn Văn Trân and Lưu Đức Hiểu, and returned to work for the Standing Committee of the Northern Party Committee. He was rearrested in September 1943 and sent again to Hỏa Lò Prison. He escaped a second time in March 1945 during a large prison-break involving over a hundred political prisoners. After this escape, he was appointed to the Tonkin Revolutionary Military Committee and placed in charge of the Hoàng Hoa Thám battlefield, which was the Bắc Sơn – Võ Nhai base area. In August 1945, Hồ Chí Minh sent him to the Việt Minh General Committee to join the National Uprising Committee, and in that capacity he attended the National Assembly at Tân Trào, Sơn Dương. He was then assigned to General Giáp. Trần Đăng Ninh liberated the town of Thái Nguyên and provided the protection detail that accompanied Hồ Chí Minh's triumphal entrance into Hanoi in September 1945. In 1947 he was appointed the Party's Chairman of the Central Inspection Commission, and from December 1949 to February 1951 he served as a deputy inspector in the Government Inspectorate. In 1950 he became a member of the Party's Military Commission and was made head of the military's General Department of Supply, also charged with leading the Party's Campaign Supply Committee.

Commemoration

Trần Đăng Ninh's name was given to a street in Hanoi, a street and a ward in Nam Định, and a street in Điện Biên Phủ. In July 1956, the Democratic Republic of Vietnam Post Office issued a set of four stamps with his portrait. A secondary school in Nam Định and the high school in Hoa Son commune, Ứng Hòa District, are named after him. A memorial was built in Hanoi in 2003 on the former land of his family in Quang Nguyen hamlet, Quang Phu Cau commune, Ứng Hòa District. In 2013, the Monument of the Communist Soldier Tran Dang Ninh was erected on the campus of Trần Đăng Ninh High School.