ABSTRACT
After the 1980 unrest, factional conflict erupted within the Urumqi Military
Region, and there were Uyghur calls for ‘self-rule’ during a 1981 visit by Deng
Xiaoping to Xinjiang. Wang Enmao, who had a reputation as a moderate and
was seen as sympathetic to local sensibilities but not to separatism, was returned
to Urumqi as Party Committee First Secretary and First Political Commissar of
the Urumqi Military Region. In 1982 under his aegis, the Xinjiang Production
and Construction Corps was strengthened to enforce CCP nationality policies,
run ‘socialist economic enterprises’, defend the border and extend the militia.
By mid-1982, it claimed to have opened up 937,500 hectares of previously
uncultivable land, established over 170 state farms and built 691 factories. It had
a ready supply of labour from the xiafang youth, demobilised PLA troops and
Han settlers.1
