"The Chinese people, comprising one quarter of humanity, have now stood up. The Chinese have always been a great, courageous and industrious nation; it is only in modern times that they have fallen behind. And that was due entirely to oppression and exploitation by foreign imperialism and domestic reactionary governments. For over a century our forefathers never stopped waging unyielding struggles against domestic and foreign oppressors, including the Revolution of 1911 led by Dr Sun Yat-sen. Our forefathers instructed us to carry out their unfulfilled will. And we have done it. We have closed our ranks and defeated both domestic and foreign oppressors through the People's War of Liberation and the great people's revolution, and now we are proclaiming the founding of the People's Republic of China. The Chinese people have stood up. Nobody will insult us again. We have stood up."

Mao Zedong, proclamation delivered from the rostrum above Tiananmen Gate, Beijing, 1 October 1949. Spoken to a crowd estimated at 300,000 people in Tiananmen Square, the speech formally announced the establishment of the People's Republic of China.