After joining the Communist Youth League of China in November 1926, Lai went to Guidong County, Hunan to join the army under the command of Mao Zedong. Having ascended to key leadership position within the Fourth Army, he went on to participate in the Huangyang Boundary Battle in 1928. As one of the divisional commanders of the New Fourth Army, he went on to attend the Gutian Congress. Lai suffered a facial wound during the First Encirclement Campaign against Jiangxi Soviet in January 1930. From December 1931 onward, he was appointed as the 13th Red Army Political Department's Secretary-General and 37th division political commissar, participating in the Ganzhou Campaign. In March 1933, Lai has filled many roles, such as director of the 13th Division's Political Department and political commissar for the 5th and 13th Corps. After participating in the Encirclement Campaigns, Lai embarked on the Long March in October 1934. With his arrival in Shanbei, he was made a deputy minister of the Soviet and concurrently was the political commissar for the region. , Lai Chuanzhu, Luo Binghui, Zhang Yunyi.
Second Sino-Japanese War (1936-1945)
In November 1937 Lai was transferred to the New Fourth Army as the Director of the General Staff Office. In 1939, New Fourth Army Commander Ye Ting and Lai brought the army out of the Dabie Mountains to rendezvous at the Jiangbei regions. By October 1940, Lai was appointed as the central headquarters chief of staff. Following the New Fourth Army incident in 1941 and the consequent annihilation of the army, Lai was appointed as chief of staff to re-establish the New Fourth Army. Thereafter, Lai assisted other commanders at the Central Anti-Japanese Base Command which resisted Japanese occupation.
In October 1945, Lai was appointed as the Shandong Field Army's column political commissar. In September 1947, he took part in the Liaoshen Campaign as the political commissar for the sixth column of the Southwest Army. During the campaign, Hong Yongsheng and him flanked and surrounded the Nationalist army group led by Liao Yaoxiang. In November 1948, he was appointed as one of the Fourth Field Army's political commissar and led troops which besieged Beijing, forcing Fu Zuoyi to shift key troops to counter them. Following the capture of Guangzhou in 14 October, Lai was appointed the Guangdong military region's first deputy political commissar.
In December 1949, Lai and Deng Hua were tasked to head the Landing Operation on Hainan Island. In 1950, communist landing operations was conducted with forces equivalent to two armies albeit the absence of a navy and air force to support the troops landing in small wooden crafts. The landed forces surrounded Xue Yue's forces and captured Haikou. Xue Yue had no choice but to retreat to Taiwan, and the People's Liberation Army took control of the whole Hainan Peninsula. This campaign was the first amphibious assault won by the PLA. In September 1950, Lai was made the deputy minister of the Central Military Commission's political cadre department, responsible for the 1955 PLA rank evaluation process. In 1955, he was awarded with the rank of general, Order of Bayi, Order of Independence and Freedom and Order of Liberation. In October 1959, he was made the second political commissar of the Shenyang Military Region. He is a member of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Central Military Commission of the People's Republic of China and the National People's Congress. On 24 December 1965, Lai Chuanzhu died in Shenyang, China.
