"Some people are arrogant and arrogant, and they always think that they are great! Even to the superior commanders, he dared to say strange things! Say something like 'Don't always use your fingers to card by card on the map!' 'Where does the big picture come from without looking at the map?' Without finger cards, how do you know where the troops are? How to command troops? ....”
In May 1947, the People's Liberation Army experienced a life-and-death battle against Meng Lianggu. The importance of this battle is self-evident, and the price paid by our own side is also not small. After the battle, everyone finally had time to sit down, sum up their experiences, and celebrate their victory. Thus, there was a celebration meeting. However, at the meeting that should have been full of joy and laughter, Commander Chen Yi was rarely "mad"! He turned on the "hair dryer" violently in the direction of the 9 column general and said the above words. But after he said a few words, he suddenly stopped abruptly and asked, "What about Xu Shiyou?" Then he laughed unconsciously.
The 9 columns commanded by General Xu Shiyou were the main attackers of the Menglianggu Campaign. When the battle did not go well, it was his persistence that made the two commanders Chen Yi and Su Yu make up their minds and complete this miracle. But at the post-war celebrations, how did he not appear? What does That Remark of Mr. Chen have to do with him?
It all started in early 1947.
After the major reorganization in 1946, the major field armies of the People's Liberation Army have begun to take shape. At this time, there was no East China Field Army, and there were two major field armies in the Shandong and central Jiangsu areas: the Shandong Field Army and the Central China Field Army. Among them, the commander of the Shandong Field Army was Marshal Chen Yi, and the commander of the Central China Field Army was General Su Yu. At that time, Xu Shiyou led his troops of the Jiaodong Military Region to join the Shandong Field Army. At that time, their nickname was the Ninth Column of the Shandong Field Army, and Xu Shiyou was the commander.
At the beginning of its formation, the Shandong Field Army had not yet been completely freed from the guerrilla state, and the coordination between the troops was not good. Moreover, most of the enemies they faced were Chiang Kai-shek's concubines, and their combat effectiveness was very strong. Therefore, during that period, the shandong field army's record was not good, and even Commander Chen Yi thought of giving up and letting Xu Qianqian take over him.
On the other hand, the Central China Field Army has achieved very outstanding results. Commander Su Yu's command was fascinating, and there was a "seven battles and seven victories" in the Soviet Union, which very well improved the overall morale of the Platon Army. Later, after discussion by the Party Central Committee, it was decided to merge the Shandong Field Army and the Central China Field Army to form the "East China Field Army," with Chen Yi as commander and Su Yu as deputy commander. However, Su Yu was the first person in charge of military work.
The adaptation was completed in January 1947. In March, the Nationalist heavy army group began to besiege Shandong. Therefore, Su Yu issued an order, so that all columns relied on the Yimeng Mountains to use high-intensity marching to tear apart the enemy's distance and seek opportunities to annihilate the enemy!
Su Yu's tactics were the magic weapon for our army's victory at that time. Due to the inferiority of its own weapons, the PLA was unable to fight positional warfare with the enemy or surround and annihilate the overly powerful corps. Therefore, they can only lead the enemy into the mountains and make a disconnect between the various units of the other side with high mobility, so that they can find the single combat unit and concentrate on destroying it.
But at this time, this tactic really made the PLA soldiers suffer a lot. Yimeng Mountains, mountains and mountains, ridges and ridges, stretching endlessly. Huaye's troops marched in the mountains every day, but they might not be able to find good fighters and fight several victorious battles. Sometimes even running forward for dozens of miles, not even seeing the shadow of an enemy.
Military personnel take obedience to orders as their duty, while the PLA troops have stricter military discipline. But no matter how good military discipline is, it can't stand the aimless running every day. As a result, many soldiers and commanders began to stir up emotions, including Xu Shiyou.
In early May 1947, after consultation between Su Yu and Chen Yi, it was decided to withdraw his troops to laiwu and the area east of Xintai, taking the initiative to show weakness and lure the enemy. When Chiang Kai-shek saw this posture, he asked Gu Zhutong, the minister of national defense, what he thought. As a result, after discussion between the two men, they felt that the East China Field Army was "tired of the offensive and unable to fight a decisive battle." So they ordered the First Corps on the right wing, with the integrated 74th Division as the backbone, to pursue and advance!
This is the opportunity that Su Yu is waiting for!
At that time, the 7th Army, the reorganized 48th Division, and the reorganized 74th Division of the Kuomintang troops were all in good positions, and Su Yu could choose which one to fight first. According to the original plan, Su Yu set the target of annihilation as the 48th Division. He issued an order for Xu Shiyou to rush to the assembly position. Xu Shiyou did not dare to be idle, and came with the officers and men of the 9th Column to a rapid march, and only ran 70 miles in just a few hours!
However, inside Huaye's headquarters, Su Yu looked at the map and was amazed. He had just received a report that the enemy's ace army, the reorganized 74th Division, was advancing very fast, had completely separated from other units, and was in a lonely position!
The Kuomintang reorganized 74th Division, known as the head of the "five main forces" of the Nationalist army, was a very strong unit. In the War of Resistance Against Japan, the 74th Army, the predecessor of the reorganized 74th Division, made great achievements in battle, and once won two flying tiger flags! After the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, Chiang Kai-shek supplemented them with a full set of American-style equipment to further enhance their combat effectiveness. Moreover, its division commander Zhang Lingfu is also a battlefield general and has a strong battlefield command ability. His existence has always been a piece of Hua Ye's heart disease.
So, can you take this opportunity to get rid of this heart disease? Su Yu pondered for a long time and expressed his opinion to Chen Yi: abandon the 48th Division and go all out to encircle and annihilate the reorganized 74th Division!
Su Yu made this choice after careful consideration. Politically speaking, the reorganized 74th Division is too famous, and annihilating him can frighten the enemy's will; from the perspective of military mentality, the division commander Zhang Lingfu is arrogant and has already offended many people, and he will not be desperately rescued by others when he has an accident; geographically speaking, the reorganized 74th Division has now burst into the area in front of Tanbu, and its position is the most abrupt. Therefore, although it is very difficult, attacking the integrated 74th Division is the least risky and the most beneficial.
Therefore, Su Yu made arrangements: the 1st, 4th, 6th, 8th, and 9th columns and special forces columns as the main offensive tasks; the 2nd, 3rd, 7th, and 10th columns as the reinforcement tasks; and the other local troops used all their strength to contain all the reinforcements and attack the enemy near the Tai Highway.
After the decision was made, Su Yu grabbed the phone, called Xu Shiyou, and ordered him to hurry back the same way and go to the front line of Tanbu to block Zhang Lingfu!
After receiving the order, the officers and men of the 9th Column were reluctant. Just ran over, and I'm going to run back again. More than a hundred miles back and forth, where is it so easy? Xu Shiyou was also angry, he grabbed the phone and roared: "You only know that you have one card and one card on the map, but the soldier has two legs!" After saying that, he was still angry, and he slammed the microphone on the telephone with a "snap"!
At this time, Su Yu on the other end of the phone was already flushed with anger! For Xu Shiyou's attitude of "committing the following crimes", he certainly cannot tolerate it. But he also knew that the soldiers of the 9th Column were really hard, and it was normal to complain. If you have to pursue it yourself, I am afraid that I will hurt the hearts of the military. Moreover, he also believed that Xu Shiyou would still carry out orders.
Sure enough, after Xu Shiyou picked up the phone, he squatted on the ground and sulked for a while, then slapped his thigh and roared: "All go back!" Right away! Run forward! ”
In this way, the 9th column arrived at its destination overnight. At this time, Xu Shiyou realized that what he was about to face was the Kuomintang's ace reorganized 74th Division! At this moment, he was happy. Xu Shiyou has never been afraid of hard work, and he is afraid of not fighting. And the stronger the enemy, the happier he is.
The enemy's movements were indeed as Su Yu had expected. On May 14, Zhang Lingfu continued to attack Tanbu according to his own established plan. But then he got information that near the strategic points such as Tianma Mountain and Leishi Mountain around him, a large number of People's Liberation Army suddenly appeared! Zhang Lingfu also felt that he might be surrounded, so he hastily retreated in the direction of Meng Lianggu and Duozhuang.
At this point, it is the turn of the 9 column to appear. Originally, they were tasked with entangling the 74th Division and buying time for the brother troops to take their places. The measure of this task is difficult to grasp, neither to give way to the enemy to run, nor to fight too firmly to make the enemy retreat, and at the same time not to let them stand still. This kind of battle made Xu Shiyou feel that he could not let go of his hands and feet. On the first day, he held his position during the day, but at night he received an order from Su Yu: The troops temporarily retreated! Xu Shiyou carried out the order without saying anything, but was very reluctant. The next day, he let out a message: Whoever asks me to withdraw I will not withdraw! Death does not retreat! However, in the evening, the 9th Column received orders to retreat a little. The combat staff officer took the order to go to Xu Shiyou, and Xu Shiyou said helplessly, "What else do you ask?" Withdraw and execute the order! ”
The effect of these two days of tug-of-war is very remarkable. Under the resistance of the 9th Column, the reorganized 74th Division advanced less than three kilometers in two days. They want to enter and can't get in, want to retreat and are not willing, and they have lost time in vain. At this time, under the command of Wang Bicheng, the 6th Column took the material receiving point of the reorganized 74th Division. This Kuomintang ace troops had their way back and were trapped in a narrow strip of land within a few miles of Meng Lianggu!
At this point, the campaign moved to the next stage: the encirclement and annihilation phase.
When Chiang Kai-shek learned that the 74th Division was surrounded, he immediately organized a large number of troops to come to the rescue. And Zhang Lingfu is really strong, not so easy to take. Hua Ye had to face two powerful enemies at the same time, and the pressure could be imagined. As mentioned earlier, Su Yu divided the 10 columns in his hands into two groups, 5 columns to solve the problem of reorganizing the 74th Division, and 5 columns to block reinforcements.
But at this time, the enemy had gathered nearly 200,000 rescue troops, and the Huaye reinforcements could not support it for too long. If, in a short period of time, the integrated 74th Division is not annihilated, and the reinforcements fail, Nahuaye may fall into a situation of counter-encirclement, then the situation will be dangerous!
On May 13, the battle officially began. Although the reorganized 74th Division had thrown away most of its heavy equipment before embarking on MengLianggu, its combat effectiveness should not be underestimated. Relying on the stones on the mountain, they kept fighting back against the People's Liberation Army. Huaye's troops attacked day and night, but the results did not meet expectations.
At this time, the outside of the encirclement circle has also begun. The Nationalist troops, led by Li Tianxia and Huang Baitao, launched one charge after another, and the pressure on Huaye's reinforcements was enormous.
Commander Chen Yi was impatient, and he made one phone call after another to the front line, looking for the commanders of the various columns to understand the situation. He dialed Xu Shiyou's phone and asked, "How is the front line?" Can you still fight? ”
Xu Shiyou also blushed at this time, and he said to Chen Yi: "The battles have all been fought like this, can they still let them run?" I still have a division in my hand, and I have sufficient troops, please rest assured! ”
Chen Yi heard the words, and also a rush of hot blood, and said loudly to the other end of the phone: "Very good! Now I order you, at all costs, to take down Meng Lianggu! Don't be afraid to sacrifice, you lose 1000, I make up 1000; you lose 2000, I make up 2000! Whoever beats Meng Lianggu is a hero! ”
In Xu Shiyou's hand, there was indeed another division, but it was not a whole division, but a "tired division", which was the 27th division that had previously blocked Zhang Lingfu in Tanbu. In the last battle, the losses of this division were not small, and it is now resting. However, under Xu Shiyou's order, all the personnel stopped resting, and even the logistics personnel and civilian personnel went to the front line! Relying on this momentum, the 9th Column finally attacked the peak of Meng Lianggu and won the battle!
After Meng Lianggu's great victory, huaye headquarters issued a notice: All cadres at and above the regimental level of the column will go to the headquarters to hold a celebration meeting for the victory! Receiving the notice, General Xu, who did not blink in the face of thousands of troops and horses, began to be a little afraid. He had yelled at Deputy Commander Su Yu before, and this matter was definitely not going to pass through Commander Chen Yi. If I went, I would definitely be criticized! So he asked his commissar to lead the team. So there was the scene at the beginning of this article, Marshal Chen Yi really wanted to criticize him, but he did not criticize, but was dumbfounded by him.
After the Battle of Menglianggu, the People's Liberation Army officially entered a strategic counterattack. In the ensuing battles, Xu Shiyou, Su Yu and Chen Yi cooperated and fought many beautiful battles. These are the commanders and fighters of the People's Liberation Army, and although they complain to each other, their feelings are never affected. Moreover, in the face of orders, the PLA is never ambiguous! That's the key to our victory in the end!