Chapter 33 1. Summer Offensive

After the "Four Protections Linjiang" and "Three Visits to the South of the Yangtze River", that is, from the summer of 1947 to the summer of 1948, there was no big fight on the Northeast battlefield.From the perspective of the Kuomintang army, it is already on the defensive and unable to launch a large-scale offensive.From the perspective of our army, it is preparing for a major counteroffensive.Although our army took the initiative to launch several battles against the enemy, none of them were decisive battles. They all had the nature of preparations and rehearsals for the big battles, which can be regarded as the first trial of Iron Fist.Among them, there are lessons of success and lessons of failure.

In May 1947, in order to open up the connection between South Manchuria and North Manchuria, squeeze two fists into one fist, and wipe out more of the enemy's vital forces, our army launched a summer offensive.Beginning on May 13th, the First and Second Columns of Northern Manchuria, plus two independent divisions, went south from Fuyu and Dalai to attack Huaide first, wiped out the two regiments of the defenders, and wiped out nearly two divisions of the reinforcements.Then they captured Gongzhuling and wiped out two enemy regiments.The Third and Fourth Columns of Nanman captured Meihekou, known as one of the five strategically important places in Northeast China, on May 27, and wiped out the enemy's 184th Division (it was Yang Chaolun who rebelled after Pan Shuodan led the uprising in 1946. That part of the reorganized 184th Division) wiped out more than 6,000 enemy troops.Later, more than a dozen towns including Tonghua, Xinbin, Andong, Zhuanghe, Fuxian, Gaiping (now Gaixian) and Dashiqiao were recovered, connecting the Liberated Areas of Southern Liaoning and Eastern Liaodong.

At the same time, the Sixth Column of our army in North Manchuria and the Independent Division of East Manchuria also wiped out the enemy many times in Xiaofengman, Jichang Town and other places.After nearly a month of fighting, our army has completely controlled the middle section of the Shenyang-Jilin railway, the eastern section of the Meihekou-Siping railway, and most of the areas between Shenyang and Changchun.Except for big cities such as Changchun and Jilin, the Liberated Areas of East Manchuria and South Manchuria are connected together.In this way, the three base areas of North Manchuria, East Manchuria, and South Manchuria formed an entire contiguous area south of the Songhua River, and our army achieved preliminary victories in the first stage of the summer campaign.