Lei Feng with young pioneers.

Lei Feng is a youthful PLA (People's Liberation Army) soldier whose humble demeanor and self-sacrifice to Mao Zedong and the Communist party has been upheld as a role model in various propaganda campaigns of the past 33 years. (The first such campaign was launched by Lin Biao in 1963.) His latest incarnation and revival came after the June 4th 1989 Tiananmen square massacre. Some people believe Lei Feng is fictional character plucked out of thin air concocted to serve the party's propaganda machine.