Chapter 34 Two, World War II Siping

The second stage of the summer campaign was the Battle of Siping.In the history of the Liberation War in Northeast China, this is "World War II and Siping". Introducing World War I and Siping, we have already talked about Siping's important position on the Northeast battlefield.It can be said that whoever controls Siping will take the initiative in the Northeast battlefield. In 1946, after holding on for a month, our army lost Siping, and the Kuomintang army took a severe knife between South Manchuria and North Manchuria, which made our army suffer a lot.Now, our army is determined to recapture Siping.

Siping's defender is Chen Mingren, commander of the enemy's 71st Army. Chen Mingren is a native of Liling, Hunan Province. He was born in the first phase of Huangpu. He was known for his bravery when he was a student in the military academy. In January 1946, he led the 71st Army to the Northeast to participate in the civil war.The 71st Army was reorganized from Chiang Kai-shek's security forces, and it has repeatedly made military exploits in the past. It stands to reason that Chen Mingren and his 71st Army should belong to the main force of Chiang Kai-shek's direct line.However, due to Chen Mingren's strong nature, he was a rare person in the Kuomintang army who even dared to contradict Chiang Kai-shek (in the winter of 1941, Chen Mingren was ordered by Chiang Kai-shek to be escorted back to Chongqing by the military police for punishment because he "contradicted the leader" and "insulted the leader" in Kunming. Later, Guan Linzheng, the highest officer of the Yunnan garrison at that time, and Long Yun, the leader of the local forces in Yunnan Province, jointly pleaded with Chiang Kai-shek to be exonerated), so Chen Mingren's status in the Kuomintang army is actually a non-directed descendant in the direct line, but his combat effectiveness is indeed quite strong .

The 71st Army has basically been in the Siping area since it arrived in the northeast. Not long ago, when it went north to rescue the Siege of Dehui and the Siege of Huaide, the 71st Army was hit hard by our army, and its establishment was incomplete.There is also the 54th Division of the 13th Army stationed in Siping, which was also severely damaged by our army when it was in South Manchuria.These two units were fully restored after being supplemented by local armed forces.Including some local troops and police forces, the defenders totaled about 34,000 people.Since the 71st Army has been stationed in Siping for a long time, and Siping is a place that must be contested by military strategists, Chen Mingren has already expressed to all walks of life his determination to "swear to live and die with Siping", so the 71st Army has established a fairly complete military system in Siping. The self-proclaimed "bronze wall and iron wall" multi-level defense system has added great difficulty to our army's offensive.

Siping's fortification system is quite complete. There are fish-scale deep group bunkers with reinforced concrete structures around the urban area, passages between each support point or group bunker groups, and basements and satellites in each core position. Positions, and satellite positions are composed of multiple obstacles.These multiple obstacles are: foot pits, dense small wooden frames, multi-layer barbed wire, deer villages, low earth walls, deep trenches with wooden stakes and tripwires in the water, series of bunkers and traffic trenches.There are mines and high-voltage power grids in front of the traffic arteries, the main attack direction, and the core positions, and between the main support points.There are independent ammunition equipment depots and power generation equipment at each fulcrum.All the personnel and buildings in the entire city must serve the city defense. There are fortifications on the buildings, bunkers on the houses, traffic is blocked, and the shooting area is cleared.This kind of defense system has never been encountered by our army in siege warfare in the past.

At the beginning of June 1947, our Northeast Democratic Alliance Army began to siege Siping.Lin Biao invested a total of 7 divisions in attacking fortifications and 17 divisions in reinforcements.The frontline commander of the siege was Li Tianyou, commander of the first column. Li Tianyou was transferred to the first column not long ago as the commander, and Wan Yi, the former commander of the first column, was transferred to the political commissar. On June 11, our army's offensive started.After gradually clearing the perimeter, a general offensive was launched on the night of the 14th.In Chen Mingren's own words, "After more than 20 years of fighting, this is the first time I have seen such fierce artillery fire."The three independent divisions of Yizong and Ximan broke into the urban area from the southwest and northwest, and engaged in street fighting with the enemy. They competed repeatedly and fought fiercely. On the 17th, our Sixth Column also went into battle and broke into the central defensive area of ​​the urban area.However, because Chen Mingren ordered his subordinates to stand guard, and announced the "ten killing orders" such as "kill those who retreat before the battle", "kill those who abandon their positions", and any retreater will be shot by the second-line army immediately, so the guards of the enemy 71 are very tenacious. In addition, there is the Kuomintang Air Force in the sky to assist in the battle and drop ammunition by air, so it is much more difficult to fight than our army originally estimated.

After 19 days and nights of bloody battles, our army captured three-quarters of Siping City, but the 71st Army was still desperately defending.Chen Mingren organized all the civil servants in the city and assigned them to various positions to participate in the defense. Even the food packages in the warehouse were used to build fortifications and engage in "scorched earth warfare".Chen Mingren also ordered to use the "bean-scattering" tactic we saw in the movie later, that is, to scatter bags of soybeans used to repair fortifications all over the streets (this tactic was first used in the "January 28th" Songhu War of Resistance It was used by the 19th Route Army to deal with the Japanese army). Our army fell to the ground due to unstable standing as soon as it stepped on the ball-like soybeans during the attack.

In short, Chen Mingren tried his best to defend desperately.In this way, it is difficult for our army to win Siping in a short time. Chiang Kai-shek in Nanjing saw that Chen Mingren was able to hold on to the defense in Siping, so he ordered Du Yuming to rescue the siege of Siping. He also sent Jiang Jingguo to Shenyang and the New Sixth Army with his personal letter to spread his preaching: "The gains and losses of Siping are related to the situation. With the development of the situation in the entire Northeast, we must have the determination to fight the communist army in the Siping Street area." Du Yuming was still in the hospital at this time, so he had to let Zheng Dongguo lead the New Sixth Army, the Fifty-second Army, and the Ninety-third Army Together with the 10 divisions of the 53rd Army that were recently transferred from Guannei to the Northeast, with the support of the Air Force, they went northward at starry night, and transferred the new army from Changchun to the south to help Siping from both sides.Beginning on June 23, the third, fourth, and second columns of our army's reinforcements and the enemy began a blocking battle no smaller than the siege south of Siping, and it was all positional warfare, which lasted for a whole week.

Lin Biao considered that the Battle of Siping had been fought for 20 days, the troops were exhausted and casualties were great, the enemy's reinforcements were constantly gathering at Siping, the air force was providing strong support, and the enemy's 93rd Army had already broken through our army's blockade and arrived in the suburbs of Siping. The enemy's new Sixth Army has begun to detour to our siege troops to implement anti-encirclement.It doesn't make much sense to fight any longer, and there is still the possibility of being "enveloped layer by layer" by the enemy. On July 1, Lin Biao ordered the withdrawal from the battle.

This Siping battle is the Siping of World War II in the War of Liberation, and it is also the core of our army's summer offensive on the Northeast battlefield.This summer offensive lasted 50 days. Our army wiped out a total of 82,000 enemies and conquered 42 towns during the siege and reinforcements.After World War II and Siping, the Kuomintang troops in the Northeast could only be trapped in nine large and medium-sized cities, and the small and medium-sized towns and villages in the entire Northeast and Jireliao regions were basically controlled by me.Therefore, the results of World War II and Siping are not small.However, the planned goal of the campaign, that is, the task of conquering Siping was not completed.For this reason, it is very important to summarize the Siping of World War II after the war. Withdrew from the battle on July 1, and on July 2, Lin Biao, Luo Ronghuan, and Liu Yalou jointly issued instructions to conduct a serious summary; I blamed myself in the letter.In a meeting, Lin Biao once made it clear: "It is mainly my responsibility that Siping was not defeated."

The inability to win Siping shows that our army's ability to attack fortified areas is not enough, and there are not many ways to deal with a strong defense system.Therefore, the summary of how to attack the fortifications is very meaningful for future operations. The famous "four groups and one team" tactic (that is, to form four groups of firepower, assault, blasting, and support during the attack on the fortifications to form a commando team with division of labor and cooperation) is Lin Biao summed it up based on the speech of Long Shujin, the commander of the Sixth Vertical and Seventeenth Division.As a front-line commander, Li Tianyou himself clearly realized in his summary that he had committed the problem of underestimating the enemy and being impatient. He believed that "from a fundamental point of view, Siping should not be fought" and that "in the future, in the Northeast All cities with relatively high strategic value and relatively strong fortifications, such as Changchun, Jilin, Shenyang, Jinzhou, and Siping, not only in the northeast, but as long as there is a possibility of reinforcements in the pass, we must temporarily avoid such attacks. city".There may have been many people who held Li Tianyou's opinion at that time. 40 years later, when Admiral Han Xianchu reviewed and reflected on the situation in the Northeast, he believed that "the battle of Siping was an unsuccessful battle."What is particularly important is that "for a long time later, even on the eve of the Liaoshen Campaign, in Lin Biao's mind, and in the psychology of some commanders, there was the idea that he still had concerns about attacking big cities."This can be seen in future battles.

Here, Chen Mingren must also be mentioned.This general who made a will to die in the battle of Siping and carried out the coffin prepared for himself can be said to be loyal to the Kuomintang regime.At that time, Chiang Kai-shek also awarded him a medal and was promoted to commander of the Seventh Corps.However, soon after, Chiang Kai-shek's confidant Chen Cheng reported to Chiang Kai-shek to remove Chen Mingren from his military post on the grounds of "building fortifications with grain bags aided by the United States", and transferred him to the idle position of the presidential palace to join the army.Therefore, Chen Mingren's subordinates said: "A military commander hangs a medal on his chest and holds a dismissal order in his hand. It is chilling."Therefore, when it was necessary to choose a place to regain military power, Chen Mingren declined the invitation of Liu Zhi, Du Yuming, Hu Zongnan and others from the KMT's direct lineage, and went to the Guangxi leader Bai Chongxi in October 1948. In February 1949, he returned to his hometown of Hunan with two armies as the commander of the First Corps. In July, he became the commander-in-chief of the Hunan Provincial Appeasement Command and the Changsha garrison commander.He released all the CCP members and revolutionaries imprisoned by Kuomintang agents, and conspired with Cheng Qian, a veteran of the Kuomintang and chairman of Hunan Province, to revolt. On August 4, they sent an uprising telegram to the whole country, enabling Hunan to be liberated peacefully. In September, Chen Mingren was invited to Beijing to attend the first session of the CPPCC National Committee.Mao Zedong once specially invited him to his home for dinner, and said to him: "You should still lead the troops in the future. We have decided to reorganize your First Corps into the People's Liberation Army, and you will be the commander." On November 1, Chen Mingren More than 70,000 people in the headquarters were reorganized into two armies and renamed the 21st Corps of the Chinese People's Liberation Army. Chen Mingren served as the commander and became the senior commander of our army.Later, the 21st Corps was reorganized into the 55th Army, stationed in Zhanjiang, Guangdong, to defend the southern gate of the motherland. In 1955, Chen Mingren was awarded the rank of general of the Chinese People's Liberation Army (there are only 3 uprising generals among the founding generals of our army, namely Chen Mingren, Dong Qiwu and Tao Zhiyue), and won the first-class liberation medal. On May 21, 1974, Chen Mingren died of illness in Beijing.