Deng joined China’s burgeoning communist revolution, led by Mao ZeDong, as a political and military organizer. He cut his revolutionary teeth on the fabled “Long March” of 1934-35 when the fledgling Chinese Communist movement escaped capture by the Nationalist Chinese Army. War broke out against Japan in 1937 and Deng served as educational leader of the Chinese Revolutionary Army, helping it grow into a large military machine during the Communist Revolution, 1946-49.