China Uncataloged Shanghai Air Defense Order

[Guest Rick Research]

This decoration does not appear in the eccentricly sized PLA Museum "Catalog" book, nor in any other Chinese books on awards that I have ever seen.

I have seen exactly THREE of this award in ten years-- mine, another the same seller had, and the one currently on Igor Moiseyev's "Collect Russia" sales website.

I have never seen another award booklet, nor another photo in wear-- following.

The star itself is a hard silvery metal alloy of some type, VERY weakly (now, anyway) gilt. It appears to have been entirely gilt when new, and that finish has simply evaporated off over time. Below are scans taken of the same piece--with a camera and with a scanner-- showing the difficulty of capturing "actual color." The red star is a thick semi-paint enamel as commonly found on PRC decorations of this period.

[Guest Rick Research]

And WHAT period was it awarded? The nameless "bearer" Soviet style award booklet does not say.

Here is the award booklet, never even folded in half. Front cover (on left) says "Certificate Air Defense Order Shanghai"

[Guest Rick Research]

And the inside, page 2 on the right and page 3 on the left, following Chinese right-to-left.

Page 2 indicates that it was issued by the Political Department of the 3rd Field Division. Typical of Soviet awards in other languages, it bears the Cyrillic "Shankhay" pencilled on top ( Шaнхaй )

The large red chop stamp on page three shows that it was issued by the Eastern Headquarters of the Chinese People's Liberation Army Command. Running down the outside left margin there are the printed characters for "1-9-5-0 Year" and printed spaces left blank for "month" and "day."

So this decoration was originally created in 1950. It has only been partially translated, so what else it says here is unknown to me.

Invisible to the scanner-- which "sees" merely rather "spotty" looking yellow pages, and indeed to the naked eye as well, are very pronounced banknote type watermarks in a herringbone pattern running ///// the entire yellow of the inside pages. This magically appears under a plain old black and white copy machine!

[Guest Rick Research]

Here is Guards Major of Electrical Engineering Vasily Timofeevich Karambirov, 1st Guards Anti-Aircraft Searchlight Regiment

wearing the Shanghai Air Defense Order in a personnel file photograph attested on...

12 January 1954.

We can thus say that this regional Red Chinese decoration was awarded

during the Korean War

to secret Soviet personnel there in event of World War Three

[Guest Rick Research]

For KNOWN Red Chinese awards for the Korean War, see

http://gmic.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=2425&hl=

[Guest Rick Research]

I just had a 4th in my hands last week, and the visiting European owner reported having seen 1 other--

that makes 5 of these in 10 years, with ONE award document and ONE photo in wear.

[No one]

Dear Gentlemen,

 

If I may, this is not an "order" but a "commemorative medal":

 

 

 

 

There are a few, from time to time, on sell on Chinese auction sites. Although rare, it is not uncommon.

 

Yours sincerely,

No one