Song Jian (Chinese: 宋健; Wade–Giles: Sung Chien; born 29 December 1931) is a Chinese aerospace engineer, demographer, and politician. He was deputy chief designer of China's submarine-launched ballistic missile (JL-1) and one of the country's leading scientists in the post-Cultural Revolution era. After a decade of two-child restrictions in the 1970s, and following the Chinese government's announcement in 1979 to advocate for one child per family, he became a leading advocate for rapid implementation and broad coverage of China's one-child policy. He served in high-ranking political positions including Vice Minister of Aerospace Industry, Director of the State Science and Technology Commission (1985–1998), vice-premier-level State Councillor (1986–1998), President of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, Vice Chairperson of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, and a member of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party.
Early life and education Song Jian was born on 29 December 1931 in Rongcheng, Shandong Province. In 1946, he enlisted in the Chinese Communist Party's Eighth Route Army during the Chinese Civil War at the age of 14. After the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949, he studied at the Harbin Institute of Technology and Beijing Foreign Language Institute, before being sent to the Soviet Union in 1953 on the recommendation of Liu Shaoqi, Vice Chairman of China. Described as a "brilliant" student, he studied cybernetics and military science under the theorist A. A. Feldbaum. He earned an associate Ph.D. degree from Moscow State University and a Ph.D. from Bauman Moscow State Technical University. He published seven papers in Russian on control theory, which won praise from Soviet and American scientists.
Career After the Sino-Soviet split in 1960, Song returned to China and was put in charge of control systems at the Fifth Academy (later known as the Seventh Ministry of Machine Building or Missile Ministry) of the Ministry of National Defense. He was one of China's top experts on missile guidance systems. Qian Xuesen, the "father of China's space and missile defence programs", highly praised Song's ability and declared that Song was China's foremost control theorist, surpassing Qian himself. Qian personally chose Song to co-author the revised edition of his Engineering Cybernetics, regarded as a bible of Chinese military science. In 1962, Song and Guan Zhaozhi were recruited by Qian to establish China's first cybernetics laboratory with him. At the beginning of the Cultural Revolution, Song's home was ransacked by the Red Guards before Premier Zhou Enlai included him in the list of the top 50 scientists considered indispensable to national defence and afforded special protection. Song was sent to the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in the desert, where he could focus on his studies and research, before returning to Beijing in 1969. His work on anti-ballistic missiles attracted Zhou's attention. In the late 1970s, Song applied his expertise in cybernetics to the problem of population control and became a proponent of China's so-called one-child policy. At the same time, he continued to work in the missile and aerospace programs and rapidly ascended the political hierarchy. He was appointed deputy chief designer of JL-1, China's submarine-launched ballistic missile in February 1980 (under Huang Weilu), and Vice Minister of Aerospace Industry in 1982. In 1985 he became Director of the powerful State Science and Technology Commission, and the next year he additionally became a State Councillor, a vice-premier-level position. He held both positions until 1998, when he was appointed President of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and Vice Chairperson of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC). Song was an alternate member of the 12th Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party, and a full member of the 13th, 14th, and 15th central committees.
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