Remembering Zhao Yansun, interpreter for the Chinese Expeditionary Force

On the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the victory of the Chinese People's War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression and the World Anti-Fascist War, Zhao Liping drew inspiration from a photograph of her mother, taken more than 80 years ago at Central China University, to retrace her father Zhao Yansun's path of setting aside his studies to join the army. He attended an interpreter training program and later became an army interpreter supporting China's war effort. Upon graduation, he was commissioned as a major and third-class interpreter, later serving with the Chinese Expeditionary Force.

To piece together his story, the daughter contacted Central China University and the Second Historical Archives of China, where she obtained her father's military service records and rare photographs. After the war, Zhao Yansun joined the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and became a distinguished Bai scholar of linguistics.

His daughter recalled once asking him about his time with the Chinese Expeditionary Force. "Many interpreters faced hardships after demobilization, but he never regretted it," she said. "He felt it was his duty to put the nation's interests above all else, and he had no regrets at all."