Two Bombs City 两弹城

About Two Bombs City

The Academy was built in the late 1960s as the headquarters of China's second nuclear-weapons research base after Qinghai; its headquarters moved here from Qinghai in 1969 and moved away to Mianyang Science City in 1992. In the 23 years it was based here, the National Development and Reform Commission's account records that its staff organised the completion of 29 nuclear tests and the weaponisation and finalisation of the atomic and hydrogen bombs, along with new-generation weapons research; the scenic area's own site instead gives the number of tests as 22. 'Two Bombs, One Satellite' Meritorious Medal recipients including Yu Min, Wang Ganchang, Deng Jiaxian, Zhu Guangya, Chen Nengkuan, Zhou Guangzhao and Cheng Kaijia, and generals including Zhang Aiping and Li Jue, worked or left their mark here.

The site still preserves 167 buildings dating from the 1960s, including the grand auditorium, an office building, an archive building, a model hall, an intelligence centre, together with air-raid shelters and a 'National Soul' stele forest, and was included among the hundred leading new cultural-relic discoveries found nationwide in China's third national survey of cultural relics. It has since been named a National Classic Red Tourism Scenic Area, a national key cultural relic protection unit, a national defence science and technology industry military-industrial culture education base, a national primary- and secondary-school practice education base, a national social-science popularisation base and a national industrial heritage site.

What to look for

• Deng Jiaxian's former residence, where he lived for fourteen years.
• The General's Building, also called the Little White House, built in the late 1970s to accommodate the most senior visiting leaders and named for General Zhang Aiping, a frequent visitor who stayed in room 205.
• Wang Ganchang's former residence, named for the nuclear physicist and Meritorious Medal recipient who was honorary chairman of the Jiusan Society Central Committee.
• The Two Bombs History Hall, in two buildings: a first hall of seven exhibition rooms on the development of China's nuclear-weapons programme and a second of four rooms on the results of weaponising the bombs.
• The Three Defence Education Hall, housed in a converted air-raid shelter that the Academy itself once used.

Location & getting there

Getting to Two Bombs City

Confirm the venue or campus, reservation channel and exhibition calendar. A museum name may cover more than one building.

• Search for 两弹城 with 绵阳市 and 梓潼县.