Chapter 36 4. Wei Lihuang is here again in the Northeast

Chen Cheng slipped away, and Du Yuming had been appointed as the deputy commander-in-chief of Xuzhou's "Suppression General".Chiang Kai-shek had a hard time thinking about who would be in charge of the Northeast's military affairs.After choosing and choosing, he chose Wei Lihuang. Wei Lihuang is a native of Hefei, Anhui. When he was young, he went to a barracks in Wuhan to study military affairs and received extremely strict training. In 1916, he joined the Cantonese Army in Guangzhou and served as a guard beside Dr. Sun Yat-sen.Because of his bravery and wit in fighting in the Guangdong Army, he was promoted to head of the regiment in 1921.During the Northern Expedition, he served as the commander-in-chief and deputy commander of the former enemy on the East Road, and soon he served as the commander of the 14th Division.After the Northern Expedition, he entered the Army University for further study. In 1930, he was appointed commander of the Fourteenth Army. In November 1935, he was elected as the executive member of the Central Committee of the Kuomintang.After the Anti-Japanese War began, as the commander-in-chief of the 14th Army, he took the initiative to go north from Xuzhou to fight fiercely with the Japanese army.During his combat in Shanxi, he had contact with the leaders of the Communist Party of China Zhou Enlai and Zhu Deduo, and maintained friendly exchanges with the Eighth Route Army. On April 17, 1938, he visited Yan'an as the commander-in-chief of the Second Theater and the former commander-in-chief of the enemy, and received friendly hospitality from Mao Zedong.After that, he not only allocated 1 million rounds of bullets and 250,000 grenades to the Eighth Route Army, but also showed a good attitude in many major incidents of friction between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party. In the winter of 1943, he succeeded Chen Cheng as the commander-in-chief of the Chinese Expeditionary Force. He commanded the army to forcibly cross the Nujiang River, captured and destroyed the Japanese army's general headquarters in Burma, wiped out the Japanese troops stationed in Burma, and opened up the crucial Sino-Indian communication line. Fame at home and abroad.Since many generals in the Northeast Army were subordinates of his expeditionary force, he was selected by Chiang Kai-shek as the commander-in-chief of the newly established Northeast "Bandit Suppression Headquarters" and acting director of the Northeast Xingyuan shortly after returning to China. On January 21, 1948, he flew to Shenyang to take office.

After Wei Lihuang arrived in the Northeast, the first thing to do was to expand the army. He not only transferred regular troops from the pass, but also recruited local armed forces.Soon, he had 4 corps, 15 armies and 37 divisions, with a total of 600,000 people, more than Chen Cheng's period.The second is to change the original combat strategy. He only wants to stick to the big cities, secure Shenyang, and wait for changes in the current situation, so he publicly put forward the strategy of "focusing on the face rather than the face".The third is that he saw the extreme importance of Jinzhou, and specially established the Jinzhou Command Post, and appointed his old subordinate Fan Hanjie as the commander. There were 4 armies under him, including the 54th Army that had just been transferred from Shandong.

The change of generals of the Kuomintang army did not affect our army's attack on the Kuomintang army.On the third day after Wei Lihuang came to the Northeast, our Yizong and Bazong wiped out all the 26th Divisions of the 49th Army in Xinlitun.Then, Lin Biao ordered the Fourth Column and the Sixth Column to attack Liaoyang under the command of Wu Kehua, the commander of the Fourth Column. On February 7, after our army had fully prepared, it took only 8 hours to take Liaoyang down and wipe out more than 10,000 defending enemies.After capturing Liaoyang, Lin Biao ordered the Fourth and Sixth Columns to attack Anshan. On February 19, our army launched a general attack on Anshan. It took only 17 hours to take Anshan down and wiped out more than 10,000 enemies.After Anshan was captured by me, the enemy defenders in Yingkou have lost their morale.Wang Jiashan, the deputy commander of the temporary fifty-eighth division stationed in Yingkou, contacted our army and decided to revolt. On February 26, Wang Jiashan led people to arrest Zheng Mingxin, deputy commander of the 52nd Army, and other military and political leaders in Yingkou, and the Yingkou Uprising succeeded.In this way, several major strongholds in southern Liaoning were all conquered by me, and I took control of Yingkou, a seaport.

The successive victories of our army did not make Wei Lihuang take any action, because he only focused on protecting Shenyang and Jinzhou in Liaoning Province.He understood that the Communist army was most interested in besieging cities and fighting for aid. If he went to rescue non-key cities, it would be tantamount to delivering food to Lin Biao.But Chiang Kai-shek was more anxious than Wei Lihuang. Chiang Kai-shek's focus was to preserve his strength so that his direct army would not be wiped out.Therefore, when he saw that the cities in southern Liaoning were lost one by one, he immediately ordered Wei Lihuang to open up the Beining Road, transfer the main force of Shenyang to Jinzhou, and guard the passage with the pass, so that if the situation in the northeast deteriorates, he can withdraw his troops to the pass.According to Chiang Kai-shek's arrangement, Shenyang, Siping, and Changchun may not be considered.However, Wei Lihuang was unwilling to do this, because doing so would be tantamount to losing the Northeast.If such a result occurs, all the responsibilities will be borne by him, the chief official in the Northeast.At that time, Chiang Kai-shek can accuse him of any crime, and he will definitely be a sinner who "defends the land without a way" and takes the blame for Chiang Kai-shek.Therefore, Wei Lihuang sent his deputy commander-in-chief Zheng Dongguo and chief of staff Zhao Jiaxiang to state his opinions twice to Chiang Kai-shek, explaining why the Shenyang garrison could not be transferred at present, and only then maintained the temporary immobilization situation.

Wei Lihuang's defense plan is beneficial to our army.The advantage is that the enemy is basically confined to the four places of Shenyang, Changchun, Siping, and Jinzhou, which is convenient for our army to move freely; the disadvantage is that the enemy does not easily leave the city, so that our army has no chance to destroy the enemy's effective forces. Under such circumstances, the Northeast Field Army headquarters is determined to fight Siping again.Fighting Siping has three purposes: one is to cut off the connection between the enemy's South Manchuria and North Manchuria, and make the enemies in Changchun and Shenyang more isolated; To avenge the two arrows that failed to win the Siping defense battle two years ago and the Siping fortified battle a year ago.