Chapter 262 14. Lin Biao's "loss" did not affect the victory of the battle

While the Battle of Western Liaoning was raging, the 52nd Army of the Kuomintang took the opportunity to occupy Yingkou.This is what Mao Zedong has been worried about.Because although the Liao Yaoxiang Corps was heavily surrounded, it was not completely wiped out, and there were hundreds of thousands of enemy troops in Shenyang.The enemy is likely to implement a general retreat from Yingkou.In this way, the strategic goal of completely annihilating the Northeast Kuomintang army on the spot cannot be achieved.Moreover, the enemy troops retreating from Yingkou will increase the pressure on our army on the battlefield inside the pass.Suddenly, tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of troops will be added in a confrontational situation, which will cause unpredictable consequences.

On October 25, Liao Yaoxiang was going to go straight to Yingkou via Tai'an and Dawa due to obstacles encountered in Montenegro.This plan was soon seen through by Lin Biao and shattered in time.Fortunately, the columns attacked quickly and decisively, otherwise, the Liao Corps might have escaped from Yingkou.Mao Zedong called to criticize Lin Biao on this day: Neglecting the control of Yingkou caused the 52nd Army to occupy Yingkou on the 24th, which was a big mistake. Lin Biao's "loss" would have caused more serious consequences, that is, hundreds of thousands of enemy troops in Shenyang moved in full force and fled to Yingkou via Liaoyang.But Wei Lihuang's "blind command" has greatly eliminated the side effect of this "loss".

When the 52nd Army occupied Yingkou, the vanguard of the 53rd Army also entered Liaoyang and Anshan.At this time, Wei Lihuang still fantasized about defending Shenyang, and ordered the 52nd and 53rd armies to retreat to Shenyang to strengthen Shenyang's defense. The two divisions of the vanguard of the 53rd Army blindly carried out Wei Lihuang's order, and were surrounded and wiped out by the People's Liberation Army after they withdrew to Shenyang.Liu Yuzhang, the commander of the 52nd Army in Yingkou, used his brains and felt that Yingkou was much safer than Shenyang. With Du Yuming's support, he refused to withdraw and stayed in Yingkou every day hoping that Du Yuming would send a boat to pick up his troops. This big ice hole in the northeast.

On October 27, in order to make up for his "loss", when the battle to encircle and wipe out the Liao Corps came to an end, Lin Biao ordered the 9th Column and the 2nd Nanman Independent Division to cross the Liao River eastward and go straight to Yingkou. After the ninth column captured Jinzhou, it immediately participated in the battle to encircle and wipe out the Liao Yaoxiang Corps. On October 26, it marched for six days and nights and arrived near Dahu Mountain.At this time, the Battle of Liaoxi had come to an end, and only the 26th Avant-garde Division of the 9th Column caught up with the battle. The battle was not fought much, but the credit was not small: the commander of the enemy's 71st Army, Xiang Fengwu, was captured alive.

On October 27th, after receiving the order to attack Yingkou, Zhan Caifang, the commander of the 9th Column, immediately changed the rear team to the front team and rushed to Tai'an.The 25th Division became an avant-garde, and after the 26th Division was terminated, the troops who had marched for 6 days and nights started a new forced march. The rivers in southern Liaoning are crisscrossed, and most of the ships and bridges have been destroyed.Zhan Caifang ordered the big river to build a pontoon bridge, and the small river passed.From the head of the column to the soldiers, everyone was covered in water and mud. As they walked, their bodies were steaming and their clothes were dry again.

Many soldiers dozed off while walking. In order to avoid falling behind, some even issued a rope to each squad. The squad leader held the end of the rope, and the squad assistant held the end of the rope. The soldiers staggered forward in the middle. Upon seeing this, Li Zhongquan, political commissar of the column, sent an order: "Lay down Yingkou and let everyone get enough sleep." The jeep in which Zhan Caifang was riding was crushed by landmines and was blown far away by the blast.The rear of the car was riddled with holes, but no one was hurt.The engineers detected the landmines and had no time to remove them, so they only marked them with lime. After a long time, the marks became blurred, but the commander had a false alarm.

On October 30, the 25th Vanguard Division arrived at the outskirts of Yingkou and began to engage the enemy.Encountered a strong enemy stronghold in Qianshiqiaozi.Zhan Caifang immediately ordered the 25th Division to attack the stronghold with a regiment of troops, and the main force continued to advance east of Yingkou. A company of the 73rd Regiment of the 25th Division broke into Qianshiqiaozi in one fell swoop, but was ambushed by the enemy's powerful firepower.The company suffered heavy casualties and hurriedly withdrew from the village. The division commander Zeng Yongya personally rushed to the scene and found that the terrain was very unfavorable to him, and the enemy's strength and combat effectiveness were unknown, so he ordered to stop the attack and withdraw the troops to Houshiqiaozi.

The troops were extremely tired, fell asleep as soon as they stopped, and relaxed their vigilance.That night the enemy attacked with two battalions, causing heavy casualties to the 1st Battalion of the 73rd Regiment. On November 1, the 9th Column and the 2nd Independent Division discovered that the 52nd Army had signs of escaping from the sea, and immediately inserted into the urban area.At 10 o'clock on the same day, the Kuomintang army in the urban area was wiped out. In the chaos, a Kuomintang army transport ship and 22 military merchant ships tried to escape, but were immediately destroyed by field army artillery fire.Only the 52nd Army led a division with more than 10,000 people fleeing Yingkou by boat.The field army captured Yingkou and wiped out more than 14,000 enemies.

The Liaoshen Campaign, which lasted 52 days, ended successfully with the complete annihilation of 472,000 people from the Wei Lihuang Group, the Northeast "suppression general" of the Kuomintang.After the Liaoshen Campaign, the Kuomintang troops remaining in Jinxi and Huludao retreated to the pass by sea under the command of Du Yuming on November 9. On the 10th, the field army occupied Jinxi and Huludao, and wiped out part of the Kuomintang army's rear guard. Chengde was recovered on the 12th.The entire territory of Northeast China and Rehe were liberated.