What difficulties did Deng Jiaxian and Qian Xuesen encounter when they returned to China?

Qian Xuesen went to the United States as a publicly funded international student in August 1935 to study and research aeronautical engineering and aerodynamics. Before returning to China, he served as director of the California Institute of Technology's Supersonics Laboratory and director of the Guggenheim Jet Propulsion Research Center.

The earth-shaking changes in the motherland have arrived. On October 1, 1949, the first five-star red flag flew over Tiananmen Square. Five days later is the traditional festival of our nation - the Mid-Autumn Festival. On this day, Qian Xuesen and his wife celebrated this festival together with more than a dozen Chinese students. They expressed their feelings while admiring the moon. They were deeply happy for the new life of the motherland and full of longing for the bright future of the motherland. At this moment, Qian Xuesen had a strong desire in his heart: to return to the motherland as soon as possible and use his expertise to serve national construction.

At this moment, the beacon of war ignited in North Korea. U.S. imperialism, which provoked this war, is setting off a frenzied anti-*** political countercurrent in its own country, with incidents of censorship and threatening censorship of personnel from universities and other institutions occurring almost every day. Without exception, this countercurrent also affected Caltech. Due to the arrest of Weinbaum, secretary of the college's Marxist-Leninist group, the FBI's suspicion fell on Qian Xuesen. In July 1950, the U.S. government decided to disqualify Qian Xuesen from participating in confidential research on the grounds that he was friends with Weinbaum, and accused Qian Xuesen of being a member of the Communist Party of America and illegally entering the country. These groundless accusations were all dismissed by Qian Xuesen. However, Qian Xuesen could no longer bear all this and decided to return to his motherland immediately on the grounds of visiting relatives, preparing to never return. He met with Kimble, the U.S. Navy undersecretary in charge of his research work, and made a solemn statement to Kimble that he was ready to return home immediately. Kimble was shocked. He believed: "No matter where Qian Xuesen is placed, he is worth five divisions." He also shouted: "I would rather shoot him than let this guy leave the United States!" So when Qian Xuesen walked out of his office, Jin Bull immediately notified immigration authorities.

Unknowingly, Qian Xuesen made all preparations to return to China. He went through the return procedures, bought a plane ticket from Canada to Hong Kong, and handed over his luggage to a moving company for shipment.

However, just two days before their family planned to leave Los Angeles, that is, at midnight on August 23, 1950, they suddenly received a notice from the Immigration Bureau that the family was not allowed to leave the United States. At the same time, U.S. Customs detained all of Qian Xuesen’s luggage.

Qian Xuesen was forced to return to the California Institute of Technology, and the FBI sent people to monitor his family and all his actions. Things were far from that. On September 6, Qian Xuesen was suddenly illegally detained by the FBI and sent to the Immigration Bureau Detention Center.

In the detention center, Qian Xuesen was tortured like a criminal. Qian Xuesen once recalled: "Within 15 days of being detained, I lost 30 pounds. At night, the secret agents came to wake me up every hour. I couldn't get any rest at all, and I was in a state of extreme mental stress."

After Qian Xuesen was detained for no reason, teachers and students at the California Institute of Technology and Qian Xuesen’s teacher von Kamen, as well as some friendly people in the United States, made a strong protest to the Immigration Bureau, found a defense lawyer for him, and raised $15,000 in bail money. Qian Xuesen was released on bail.

From then on, Qian Xuesen continued to be persecuted by the Immigration Bureau. His movements were restricted by the Immigration Bureau and monitored by FBI agents. He was not allowed to leave Los Angeles, where he lived, and he was questioned regularly. Qian Xuesen lost 5 years of freedom in this way.

However, Qian Xuesen’s pure love for the motherland turned out to be even more intense. He missed New China day and night. He persisted in the struggle and constantly asked the Immigration Bureau to leave the United States and return to his country.

Qian Xuesen could not return to his country. During those five years, he never stopped studying the scientific career that he loved and dedicated himself to. At that time, the U.S. government prevented him from leaving the United States because the rocket technology he was studying was related to the national defense construction of the motherland, and it wanted to hinder the development of science and technology in New China by detaining him. When Qian Xuesen knew this, he felt extremely angry.

Therefore, he chose a new major of "engineering cybernetics" to conduct research in order to eliminate the obstacles to returning to China. After hard work, he wrote "Engineering Cybernetics" with more than 300,000 words in English in 1954. In fact, engineering cybernetics is closely related to production automation, the development and application of electronic computers, and national defense construction. It is just that the US authorities did not realize this at the time.

Qian Xuesen’s struggle to return to his motherland also received care and support from his motherland. On April 26, 1954, during the Indochina International Conference, Wang Bingnan, secretary-general of the Chinese delegation, and A. Johnson, head of the U.S. delegation, respectively started contacts on behalf of the two governments on the issue of the return of civilians. During the contact, Wang Bingnan specifically pointed out that the United States is preventing many Chinese living in the United States from returning to China, including scientist Qian Xuesen.

One day in June 1955, Qian Xuesen escaped from spy surveillance. In the letter he sent to his relatives in Belgium, he included a letter written on cigarette paper and addressed to Chen Shutong, Vice Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress. , asking the motherland to help him return home as soon as possible. The day Mr. Chen Shutong received the letter, he sent it to Premier Zhou Enlai. On August 1, 1955, Sino-US ambassadorial talks were held in Geneva, Switzerland. In accordance with the instructions of Premier Zhou, Ambassador Wang Bingnan negotiated with the United States based on Qian Xuesen's letter requesting to return to China, forcing the US government to allow Qian Xuesen to leave the United States and return to China.

In 1955, Qian Xuesen was allowed to return to China. He handed a newly published "Engineering Cybernetics" to his teacher von Karman. Von Karman flipped through it and said with emotion: "You have now surpassed me academically." Qian Xuesen surpassed him academically. He was extremely excited that such a world-famous authority had gained popularity for the Chinese people.

On September 17, 1955, Qian Xuesen, his wife and two young children finally boarded the American mail ship "Cleveland President" and left Los Angeles, heading for their motherland in the east.