Chapter 51 Chapter 6: The Battle of Qihui: The Plain Annihilation Battle That Surprised the Japanese Army Base Camp

After the fall of Wuhan, the War of Resistance Against Japan entered into a stage of strategic stalemate. The Japanese imperialists changed their previous policy of concentrating their main military forces against the Kuomintang to a policy of mainly politically inducing surrender and supplemented by military strikes against the Kuomintang, and gradually returned to North China in an attempt to Concentrate superior forces to eliminate our army and destroy the anti-Japanese base areas to consolidate their occupied areas.From November 1938 to the end of 1940, the Japanese army dispatched as many as 109 large-scale "mopping ups" with more than 1,000 troops in North China alone, using a total of more than 500,000 troops.

Facing the frantic attack of Japanese imperialism, Mao Zedong took it easy. At the Sixth Plenary Session of the Sixth Central Committee of the Party held from September 29 to November 6, 1938, he calmly proposed the strategic deployment of "consolidating North China and developing Central China", pointing out that "The main aspect of our party's work is in the enemy's rear of the theater", our party and our army "will go through guerrilla warfare, accumulate strength, and make ourselves one of the decisive factors in smashing Japanese imperialism." In response to the new situation in which the Kuomintang is intensifying its competition with our party and our army in Hebei and Shandong, and that the Japanese invaders may return to North China and consolidate their occupied areas, Mao Zedong ordered the main force of the Eighth Route Army to advance into Hebei and Shandong provinces, and cooperate with the local soldiers and civilians to carry out guerrilla warfare more deeply and extensively. Develop the strength of our party and our army, consolidate and expand the anti-Japanese base areas.The specific deployment is:

The 115th Division marched into Shandong; The main force of the 120th Division entered Jizhong; The main force of the 129th Division entered the plain areas such as southern Hebei, Hebei, Shandong and Henan. He Long, commander of the 120th division, Guan Xiangying, political commissar, and Xiao Ke, deputy commander of the division, attended the meeting in Yan'an. During the meeting, one day after Mao Zedong listened to He and Guan's opinions on "consolidating North China," Wang Jiaxiang and Peng Dehuai came to the residences of He Long, Guan Xiangying, and Xiao Ke to convey to them the decision of the Central Military Commission of the Communist Party of China.Peng Dehuai said: The 120th Division implements the central government's policy of "consolidating North China" and goes eastward, to the Jizhong Plain.There is no main force of the Eighth Route Army in Jizhong.There are many troops in Jizhong, but the troops are new and their combat effectiveness is not strong. When the enemy returns to the division, they will encounter great difficulties and need the main force to help them. Where the 120th division goes, they can develop themselves. There are so many people there!

Peng Dehuai also said: The struggle in eastern Jidong has failed.Jirecha is a very large place, and it can carry out anti-Japanese guerrilla warfare very well, so we use the power of Song Shilun and Deng Hua to do it.The central government decided that Comrade Xiao Ke would lead some cadres to organize the Jirecha advance and establish a new base there.It is up to you to discuss and decide which troops to take to Jizhong and which people to go to Jirecha. Jizhong, that is, the central part of Hebei Province, is located between the three railways of Pinghan, Beining, and Jinpu and the Cang (county) Shi (jiazhuang) highway. It is the main part of the North China Plain. River, Daqing River and Zhulong River run through the whole area.There are 39 counties in the region, with more than 8 million people, densely populated villages and towns, and a large population.

After the July 7th Incident, the Kuomintang army and governments at all levels fled south.After the fall of Baoding, the Provincial Party Committee of the Communist Party of China launched and organized the anti-Japanese armed forces and established the Hebei guerrilla army. In October 1937, Lu Zhengcao, a Communist Party member who was the head of the 691st Regiment of the 53rd Army of the Kuomintang Army, refused the Kuomintang’s order to flee south. Under the leadership, he carried out guerrilla warfare with the Hebei guerrilla army and established the Jizhong anti-Japanese base area.During this period, apart from those led by the Communist Party, the anti-Japanese armed forces in the central Hebei region also included landlords and gentry, Kuomintang diaspora and other teams organized by various personnel. The composition was relatively complicated.

After the Jizhong Military Region and the Third Column of the Eighth Route Army were established in April 1938, the situation has changed a lot, but there are still some teams that accept the leadership of the Military Region only in name, and guerrilla warfare and local work have not yet been fully carried out, and the troops have not been thoroughly reorganized and organized. Severe combat training, when the enemy is brutally attacking, the leadership will feel powerless to complete the task of consolidating and developing the base area. The Jizhong anti-Japanese base area not only threatened Beiping, the base camp of the Japanese army in North China, but also formed a pincer attack on the Ping-Han Railway with the Hebei area of ​​the Shanxi-Chahar-Hebei border area. The east and north also threatened the Jinpu Railway and the Beining Road. .After the Japanese invading army turned its main force to the Eighth Route Army, it would inevitably attack the central Jizhong area with heavy troops.There is no main force of the Eighth Route Army in Jizhong District, so it will encounter great difficulties.

For this reason, the Central Military Commission of the Communist Party of China decided to send the main force of the 120th Division to Jizhong to complete three tasks: first, consolidate the anti-Japanese base areas in Jizhong; second, help the third column of the Eighth Route Army that persisted in the struggle in Jizhong; After the closing of the Sixth Plenary Session, He Long, Guan Xiangying, and Xiao Ke held a two-day meeting in Yan'an to discuss the work deployment of advancing into Jizhong and organizing Jirecha to advance. On November 25, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China issued the "Opinions on the Work of the Jirecha District", officially deciding to establish the Eighth Route Army Jirecha Army, "send Comrade Xiao Ke to work, and establish a military and political committee to unify the leadership of the army and local work." .The central government also decided to allocate some cadres from Yan'an to the Jinjin Army, and "He, Guan, and Xiao will be responsible for establishing it."