In early October 1947, after the 3rd Column of the Jinji-Hebei Luyu Field Army (i.e., Liu Deng's army) highlighted the enemy's encirclement, it advanced towards the western Anhui region, and the troops attacked the enemy in multiple ways.
Chen Xilian, commander of the 3rd Column, explained to commanders at all levels when deploying this operation: "In the process of carrying out your tasks, you must be flexible and flexible in grasping the fighters, and the various departments must actively coordinate with each other. As long as you can destroy the enemy, you will fight when you are fighting, and you don't have to ask me for instructions step by step. ”
Zhao Lantian, commander of the 7th Brigade (who became the founding major general in 1955), likes to take the lead in fighting wars in peacetime, and this time he is even more excited with Commander Chen's "Shangfang Sword".
After returning to the brigade headquarters, Zhao Lantian and the political commissar Zhou Wei (the founding major general) divided the work: "I will take the reconnaissance company to the front, and you will lead the direct subordinate team to follow behind." ”
On October 8, Zhao Lantian encountered the troops of the 20th Regiment in the Huoshan area of Anhui Province, and the regimental commander Zuo Kuiyuan reported to him that they had just discovered the enemy's 88th Division, but before the two sides could exchange fire, the enemy desperately fled and ran away without a shadow.
"Then why don't you hurry up and chase it?" Zhao Lantian was in a hurry.
"The troops didn't eat for a day, and they said that they lost their targets and didn't know where to chase them, so it was better to fill their stomachs and then chase them!"
Zhao Lantian thought that it was also reasonable, so he agreed to Zuo Kuiyuan's request. But he didn't want the duck in his mouth to fly away, and he decided to do something.
Then he left the main road alone, climbed a hill, climbed a tree several feet high with his bare hands, sat on the branches, and used the telescope to observe the surrounding terrain and hostility.
The enemy may not have dreamed that a grand brigade commander in Liu Deng's army was actually "not doing his job" at this time, and he was alone in the dark of night "cameoing" as a scout, observing their movements.
In the vast night, everything in the lens looked blurry, but with the movement of the lens, Zhao Lantian suddenly had a shock in his heart: there is a situation!
There was a light in the distance, it was a market town, and judging by the dense lights, the enemy was likely to camp there.
Zhao Lantian hurried back to the troop garrison, looked up the map, and the bright place he had just found was called Zhangjiadian, where hundreds of families lived.
Just then, a scout rushed to report that he had captured a prisoner in front.
After interrogation, the prisoners' confessions completely confirmed Zhao Lantian's judgment: the enemy's 88th Division and the 62nd Brigade Brigade were camping in Zhangjiadian, planning to retreat north early the next morning to join the reorganized 46th Division.
"Good guys! It's a narrow road! The reason why Zhao Lantian was overjoyed was because he had encountered the old opponent of the 88th Division, who had eaten a half brigade of the division in Yutai, Shandong.
However, now that the 88th Division has replenished its strength and is fully equipped with American equipment, they have come to fight the 3 columns with the idea of a shame. The eagerness of this thought led the enemy to go deep alone. It's just that they are fierce and snake-headed, and when they really found 3 verticals, they made a mistake again, and before they could exchange fire, they hurriedly slipped away and hid in Zhangjiadian.
Zhao Lantian thought that this was an excellent opportunity to annihilate the enemy, but the problem was that there was only one regiment and one reconnaissance company around him at this time, and there was a huge disparity between the enemy and us, and it was still extremely difficult to eliminate them.
Just when Zhao Lantian was in a state of bitter thought because of his insistence on the commission, and his brows were locked, suddenly someone came in and reported: "Brigade Commander, Brigadier Tong Guogui of the 9th Brigade (founding major general) has arrived!" ”
When Zhao Lantian heard this, he was overjoyed: Good fellow, the reinforcements came at the right time!
Coincidentally, tong Guogui also learned of Zhangjiadian's hostility precisely because his men captured a prisoner. However, he also faced the same problem as Zhao Lantian - there were not enough troops, only one regiment around him, and he could not eat the 88th Division alone, so he came to Zhao Lantian to discuss the joint annihilation of the enemy.
The two agreed that although they only had one regiment each, they could also knock him out of the 88th Division.
After discussion, the two men decided on a battle plan: Zhao Lantian led 20 regiments to attack from the east and north, and Tong Guogui led his 26 regiments from the west and south to encircle the enemy's 88th division first, and then attacked with a joint force.
Although Chen Xilian had made a statement that the various units could act on the opportunity when they encountered the enemy, for the sake of safety, Zhao and Tong, in order to take precautions, also decided to try to get in touch with the column and the 8th Brigade of friendly and neighboring units while encircling the enemy with their combined forces, so as to avoid letting the 88th Division slip away.
At 3:00 a.m., the 20th Regiment and 26th Regiment, under the command of Zhao Lantian and Tong Guogui, quietly surrounded the enemies of Zhangjiadian.
At dawn, the enemy woke up from his dream to find himself surrounded and terrified. Subsequently, they began to desperately break through to the northeast, and launched an extremely fierce battle with the 20 regiments commanded by Zhao Lantian.
The 20th Regiment faced an enemy more than ten times its own, fought for a whole day, and just when the situation was extremely passive, Zheng Guozhong, the deputy commander of the 3rd Column (the founding major general), came to reinforcements with the 21st Regiment of the 8th Brigade.
Under the personal command of Zheng Guozhong, Zhao Lantian, Tong Guogui, and Ma Zhongquan (brigade commander of the 8th Brigade and founding major general) made reasonable arrangements for their limited forces and launched a general offensive that night!
The four later founding major generals contacted each other and together played a battle that can be completely recorded in military history, and staged a good drama!
In the fierce battle until dawn the next day, the units of the 3rd Column destroyed the enemy's 88th Division and the 62nd Brigade in one fell swoop, annihilating more than 5,300 enemy troops.
This battle was the first major victory of Liu Deng's army without support in the rear, and at the same time set a new record in the history of the 3 columns: for the first time, the enemy army was eliminated by more than one regular brigade. There is no doubt that Zhao Lantian, the brigade commander, "did not do his job" and "cameoed" as a scout, which led to this great victory in the history of the military.
It is worth mentioning that Zhao Lantian was later promoted to commander of the 31st Division of the 12th Army, and he also made outstanding achievements in the battlefield of the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea.