Chen Lu / 陈箓

Overview

陈箓 was a French-trained jurist and veteran Chinese diplomat who later became foreign minister of the Japanese-backed Reformed Government and was assassinated in Shanghai in 1939.

Current Profile

The bounded source presents Chen’s career as a sharp political reversal. He studied law in France, contributed to late-Qing legal translation and codification, and then held senior diplomatic posts under the Republic, including work connected to Mongolia, Mexico, France, and the foreign ministry. After the Nanjing government displaced the Beiyang political order and ended his official career, he later accepted office in a Japanese-backed regime created during the occupation of eastern China.

On 19 February 1939, gunmen entered his Shanghai residence and killed him in front of family members and guests. The assassins left an anti-collaborationist proclamation, making his death both a covert operation and a public message about the cost of serving an occupation regime.

Key Characteristics

• Combined French legal education with late-Qing legal translation and codification work.
• Built a long Republican diplomatic career across ministry and overseas posts.
• Lost office when the Nanjing government displaced the Beiyang establishment.
• Joined the Japanese-backed Reformed Government as foreign minister.
• Became a symbolic target of Nationalist “traitor-elimination” violence in occupied Shanghai.

Evidence

• Legal and diplomatic formation: 32 二战中的行刺：刺杀纳粹魔头海德里希，刺杀汉奸陈箓 describes French legal study, work on civil-law materials, and senior diplomatic appointments.
• Collaborationist office: 32 二战中的行刺：刺杀纳粹魔头海德里希，刺杀汉奸陈箓 places Chen in the Reformed Government established after Japan’s occupation of eastern China.
• Assassination: 32 二战中的行刺：刺杀纳粹魔头海德里希，刺杀汉奸陈箓 recounts the home attack and the proclamation left by the gunmen.

Qualifications

The source suggests that exclusion from the new Nationalist order may have influenced Chen’s later choice, but it does not establish his motive. Its body spells his name 陈禄 while the filename and title use 陈箓; this page adopts 陈箓 as the canonical form. The attackers’ exact number and the full tactical sequence remain disputed in the episode.

What Changed

• Created a profile connecting Chen’s legal-diplomatic career, collaborationist office, and assassination.

Relationships

• Wartime Collaboration under Occupation - framework for distinguishing elite client-government service from other forms of accommodation.
• 王天木 - intelligence organizer whom the source connects to the assassination plan.
• 刘戈青 - principal gunman identified by the source.
• Assassination, Reprisal, and Symbolic Resistance / 刺杀、报复与象征性抵抗 - consequence framework for the killing and its aftermath.
• 汪精卫 - leader of a later Japanese-backed Nanjing regime, distinct from the earlier Reformed Government Chen served.