Chapter 71 How big is Peng Dehuai's "appetite"?

To achieve a decisive victory in the First World War, Commander MacArthur took great pains. He dispatched troops from Japan and other places to the front line. Before the start of the second battle, the total strength of the United Nations Army had reached 553,000, including 423,300 ground troops, 55,000 air force, 75,000 navy, 1,100 combat aircraft, and 900 tanks. On the Western Front, the U.S. Eighth Army commanded the 1st Army, the 9th Army, and the 2nd Army Corps of the Korean Army, with a total of 8 divisions, 3 brigades, 1 airborne regiment, and 3 independent battalions, with a total strength of 240,000. Among them, there are more than 120,000 US troops.

On the Eastern Front, there is the 10th US Army, which has jurisdiction over the 1st, 7th, and 3rd Divisions of the US Land War, and the 1st Army of the Korean Army (under the jurisdiction of the Capital Division and the 3rd Division of the Korean Army), with a total of 103,000 people, including 78,600 US troops. million people. The United Nations army is in full swing. What MacArthur never dreamed of was that he sent so many troops with such a strong force, like a group of colorful tigers descending from the mountain, that even the Soviet Union would tremble with fright, and Mao Zedong and other Chinese generals actually wanted to send this world-class army The huge army, even the bones and soup were stewed in one pot!

The appetite is too big! Weapons are far inferior to people, so we must be as powerful as people. In order to fight this decisive battle, Mao Zedong assigned the main force of the three fields, the 9th Corps of the Chinese People's Liberation Army, known as the Song Shilun Corps, to secretly enter the DPRK and independently support the Eastern Front combat mission. In this way, the first-line combat troops of the Volunteer Army reached 9 armies, with a total of 380,000 people.Among them, there are 6 armies on the western front with 230,000 people; 3 armies on the eastern front with 150,000 people.Part of the 3rd Corps of the Korean People's Army also participated in the war on the Eastern Front.

In terms of total strength, the United Nations Army outnumbers the Volunteer Army at 1.45:1.Although the total number of troops seems to be slightly superior to the United Nations Army, the Chinese army has an absolute advantage in terms of the number of front-line combatants. The Volunteer Army has 380,000 front-line combat troops, all of whom are elite and strong generals; while the United Nations Army has only 220,000 front-line combat troops, because the navy is not very effective, and the air force is mostly for support operations, and logistics troops account for a large proportion. What is shocking is that when China's 380,000 tigers and wolves were waiting for the United Nations army to take the bait with their mouths open, the United Nations army was unaware and drove towards the Yalu River again.

This time, Mao Zedong and Peng Dehuai made up their minds. Their battle idea is: a decisive battle with the US army! The deployment of the Volunteer Army is to use the special terrain in northern North Korea to divide the two battlefields of the Eastern Front and the Western Front, and separate the American troops so that the American mechanized corps cannot be concentrated. At the same time, they took advantage of the misjudgment of the United Nations Army to lure the main force of the United Nations Army to go deep, and dispatched elite troops to suddenly detour and outflank the U.S. army, cutting off the back of the U.S. Army, and then surrounded them in an all-round way, gathering and annihilating them.

The biggest decisive battle of multinational forces after the Second World War was staged on the land of North Korea.