April 25 marks the 40th anniversary of the naming of the "Good Eighth Company on the Nanjing Road" by the Ministry of National Defense. The commemoration of the anniversary demands further study and implementation of the important thought of the "Three Represents" and the spirit of the 16th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC), and bearing in mind the "Two Musts: to keep alive the style of modesty and prudence and the style of plain living and hard struggle" so as to shoulder the sacred mission of the people's army in the new times more successfully.

The Eighth Company went to Shanghai's Nanjing Road from Xiaoyuan, a small village in Laiyang County, East China's Shandong Province in 1949, and has written a new chapter of arduous struggle, winning high praise from the three generations of the CPC's central leadership.

When the Ministry of National Defense bestowed on the company the title of the "Good Eighth Company on the Nanjing Road" on April 25, 1963, Comrade Mao Zedong wrote a poem entitled "Eulogy on the Eighth Company." Comrade Deng Xiaoping called the company "a collective model in keeping up the glorious tradition and sticking to the road of communism," and had inscribed: "Long live the Good Eighth Company on the Nanjing Road." The inscriptions by Comrade Jiang Zemin is to "learn from the fine tradition and work style of the Good Eighth Company and push forward the modernization and standardization of the revolutionary army", which has put forward new requirements for learning from the company in the new times.

During these years, the company has witnessed the comings and goings of a lot of servicemen, but the company's fine tradition has never changed. Holding high the banner of plain living and hard struggle, the "Good Eighth Company" has become one of the windows for the army to display its mental outlook.

In the past 40 years, the "Good Eighth Company" has instilled new meanings to the tradition of plain living and hard struggle. In the process of learning from the "Good Eighth Company," we must look at the tradition of plain living and hard struggle from a perspective of dialectical materialism, or to be more specific, we must not only stick to it, but also carry it forward.

Two viewpoints are likely to emerge on the tradition of arduous struggle. One holds that the tradition is outdated because China's economy has witnessed major developments and Chinese people's living standard has been greatly improved. The other argues that we should simply copy the old practices regardless of the social and economic changes.

Actually both viewpoints are wrong. The spirit of plain living and hard struggle is the source of creativity of human society. Each nation, each country and each armed forces needs the spirit of plain living and hard struggle for its development, therefore we should never give up this spirit. But the spirit is also mutable, and we should add new meanings to it in accordance with the requirements of the new times.

The 16th Party Congress set forth the goal of building a well-off society in an all-round way, and required the army to accomplish the historical dual tasks of mechanization and IT application and bring up a leapfrog development in the modernization drive of the military.

To achieve these goals, we should keep the "Two Musts" firmly in mind, and further develop the fine tradition of arduous struggle. All members of the army should be fully aware that our current well-off society is low standard, and we still lag far behind the developed countries in economy, technology and the national defense.

In the face of arduous tasks of national defense and army building, and when the world is far from tranquil, we should carefully study the instructions made by Comrades Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping and Jiang Zemin on the spirit of plain living and hard struggle, and be prepared for danger in times of safety and continue to maintain a flesh-and-blood relationship with the people. We should also study hard the important speech made by Comrade Hu Jintao during his tour in Xibaipo, and fully recognize the importance on keeping to the spirit of plain living and hard struggle.

As long as we carry forward the spirit of the "Good Eighth Company" and keep pace with the times, we are sure to make due contributions to the building of a well-off society in an all-round way, and speed up the revolutionization, modernization and standardization of the army.

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