In the Spring 1929 Chiang Kai-shek War, Chiang Kai-shek adopted a two-pronged strategy of military strikes and divisions and bribes, eliminating in one fell swoop the 100,000-strong Army of the Gui Army entrenched in the three towns of Wuhan in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River, and successfully incorporating the Two Lakes region into the territory of the Nationalist Government in Nanjing, which can be called a representative work of his usual means of dealing with warlords.
Chiang Kai-shek with Li Zongren (left) and Bai Chongxi (right).
First, the new Gui clan seized the two lakes
After the victory in the Battle of Longtan in September 1927, the contradictions between the Gui Army and the Chiang Kai-shek Army of the Northern Expedition in the Ninghu area began to intensify, and Li Zongren and Bai Chongxi's 7th and 19th Armies reached a higher level of combat strength by replenishing the captured beiyang army weapons and prisoners. He Yingqin, commander of the 1st Army, who presided over chiang kai-shek's military affairs at the National Government in Nanjing, was not to be outdone, so he expanded his troops into the 1st and 9th Armies, and firmly grasped the power of allocating military expenses, weapons, and materials, and did not allow the Gui Army to interfere.
Under these circumstances, Li Zongren and Bai Chongxi considered that in order to wage a protracted struggle against Chiang Kai-shek, they would have to occupy a base area in central China, and Wang Jingwei's Wuhan regime naturally became their primary target. It just so happened that the 6th Army's long-term cheng qian also intended to seize the two lakes area, and the two groups of people hit it off. So in mid-October, Li Zongren, Bai Chongxi, Cheng Qian, and others mobilized the 6th, 7th, and 19th Armies to march west to Wuhan under the guise of "continuing the Northern Expedition."
Commander Cheng Qian of the 6th Army and Commander He Jian of the 35th Army
Tang Shengzhibu of the 8th Army, the main force of the Wuhan army, had been watching the Battle of Longtan in Anhui, and he did not expect that the Gui Army would act on him so quickly, so he was completely defenseless, and the troops collapsed at a touch. In less than a month, the Wuhan National Government was finished, and Wang Jingwei and Tang Shengzhi announced their resignation. Bai Chongxi reorganized the surrendered Tang Shengzhi's subordinates into the 8th, 12th, and 36th Armies, and led them to North China in the name of the former enemy commander-in-chief of the 4th Army.
After the troops marched into Wuhan, the contradictions between Cheng Qian and Li and Bai began to intensify again. Cheng Qian's plan to appoint a group of progressives from the former Wuhan regime to govern Hubei well clashed with gui jun's attempt to rule hubei. So Li Zongren suddenly led his troops to surround the 6th Army one night and disarmed it, and Cheng Qian was also captured and expelled from Hubei. As for Hunan, it was entrusted to the surrendered general Tang Shengzhi and the commander of the 35th Army, He Jian.
Second, Hu and Tao ruled Hubei
After occupying the two lakes, Bai Chongxi led the army to continue the Northern Expedition, Li Zongren went to the capital Nanjing to engage in political activities, and the military and political power in Wuhan was handed over to Hu Zongduo, commander of the 19th Army, and Tao Jun, the commander of the division. Hu Zongduo and Tao Jun, both Hubei graduates of the Baoding Military Academy, ran to Guangxi after a period of unemployment to serve the Xingui clan and became friends with Mo Rebellion. The reason why Li and Bai handed over the power to them was also because they valued their background in Hubei and planned to use the ghostly saying that "the E people rule The Hubei people are ruling the Hubei people" to deceive the Hubei people into fighting for their lives.
After Hu Zongduo and Tao Jun became the masters of their hometown, they took the opportunity to expand their personal power. Because Li and Bai had a tight grasp of the personnel power of the 7th Army, and the replacement of a battalion commander had to be approved by them, Hu Zongduo expanded Tao Jun's department into the 18th Army, and the commander was naturally Tao Jun. In order to meet Jiang's army, Hu Zongduo expanded the 1st Division of the Hubei Provincial Defense Army and the 19th Division of the surrendered 6th Army into the 50th and 56th Armies, so that Hu and Tao had five armies with a total of more than 100,000 people.
Hu Zongduo, commander of the 19th Army, and Tao Jun, commander of the 18th Army
During the reign of Hu Zongduo and Tao Jun in Hubei, in the name of the "Qing Communists," they carried out a large-scale killing spree against the localities and carried out a reign of terror. Among them, Tao Jun was particularly brutal, and people called him "Tao Butcher", and the famous slogan of "it is better to kill three thousand by mistake than to let go of one" was put forward by him, and all the judgments handed to him, no matter the seriousness of the case, were written by him as "all shots to avoid trouble". It is estimated that during the one-year period when Hu and Tao ruled Hubei, no less than 20,000 to 30,000 people were killed.
Because the officers of the 18th and 19th Armies were all Hubei people, Hu and Tao took good care of these two subordinate units, and the monthly salaries were paid on time, while the 7th Army always had to delay for several months to arrive. This aroused the dissatisfaction of Li Mingrui and Yang Tenghui, commanders of the 7th Army, not to mention that at the beginning of the Northern Expedition, Tao Jun, like them, was just a regimental commander, and now they have climbed to the position of commander, which makes people feel bad! Bai Chongxi was not unaware of the contradictions in the rear, and he also sent a telegram to Li and Yang, saying that the Guangxi people had fought from their hometown in the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom to Wuhan, and they did not know that several people would be able to return home in the future, and advised them to be as tolerant as possible with the Hubei people.
Third, Chiang Kai-shek plotted against Gui
The rapid expansion of the power of the New Gui clan after the Northern Expedition made Li Zongren, Bai Chongxi and others overwhelmed, and Bai Chongxi even used the phrase "from the south to the south of the town and the south to the shanhaiguan" to describe the vast territory occupied by the Gui army. This aroused Chiang Kai-shek's disgust, and in early 1929, at the National Army Formation Conference, Chiang Kai-shek decided to first take the Gui Army, which was the greatest threat to him.
At the Commemorative Week of the Premier of the Central Military Academy in March 1929, Chiang Kai-shek gave a mobilization speech to the cadets: "Li and Bai rebelled like the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom of that year, and their ambitions were even greater than those of Hong and Yang... They often say that they want to complete the cause of Hong and Yang Weijing, which is their plot to seize revolutionary power and seize the fruits of the victory of the Northern Expedition. Principal Ben tells you that there is no Gui department without us, and there is no Gui family with us! ”
Chiang Kai-shek and political workers
Chiang Kai-shek was deeply afraid that there would be insufficient troops to attack Wuhan, so he sent people to persuade Feng Yuxiang, promising to hand over the two lakes to the Northwest Army after defeating the Gui army. Feng Yuxiang promised to send 100,000 troops to assist Jiang Jun in battle, but in fact he sat on the mountain and watched the tiger fight, planning to pick peaches while both sides were defeated and injured. At the same time, Chiang Kai-shek also took the same conditions to lobby the 4th Army Zhang Fakui, who had been driven out of Guangdong, and Zhang Fakui believed this, so he worked particularly hard when he attacked Hunan later.
After discovering the contradictions between Li Mingrui and Yang Tenghui and Hu Zongduo and Tao Jun, Chiang Kai-shek decided to adopt the strategy of bribery first. When Jiang's envoy arrived in Wuhan, it happened that Hu Zongduo was not in the presence of something, and Tao Jun, who received the envoy, arrogantly said: "You can watch and do it yourself!" Seeing that hu and Tao could not succeed in lobbying, Chiang Kai-shek sent Li Mingrui's relative Yu Zuobai to take 200,000 silver dollars to lobby Li and Yang, and Li and Yang, who were nervous at hand, took the bait as soon as they bit it, promising to turn against him as soon as the war broke out. Bai Chongxi was known as Xiao Zhuge Ge, but he did not expect that his own 7th Army of Consort Steel actually became a traitor for 200,000 silver dollars.
Fourth, Hu and Tao are self-defeating
In March 1929, seeing that the time was ripe, Chiang Kai-shek decided to send troops to attack the Gui army. He divided the troops into two routes, the Jiang Left Army and the Jiang Right Army, of which the Jiang Right Army was mixed with the Concubines and Miscellaneous Brands, with Liu Zhi as the commander-in-chief, and the Jiang Left Army, with Zhang Fakui of the Yue Army as the vanguard, and sent chen Chengbu of the Concubines to monitor them from behind. Even the students of the sixth phase of the Central Military Academy were armed to prevent Feng Yuxiang from taking the opportunity to sneak into Nanjing.
At this time, Bai Chongxi was still inconvenient to return from Beiping, Li Zongren was afraid of being arrested by Chiang Kai-shek, and had already fled from Shanghai by steamship to Guangzhou, and Xia Wei, commander of the 7th Army, had always been indifferent to things, only caring about having fun with his little wife, and the heavy responsibility of facing Chiang Kai-shek fell on Hu and Tao.
Li Mingrui, commander of the 1st Division of the 7th Army, and Xia Wei, commander of the 7th Army
Hu Zongduo and Tao Jun were not unaware of the tense military situation, and they planned to adopt the strategy of "luring the enemy deep and defending and counterattacking" in light of the characteristics of Chiang Kai-shek's large number but mixed and mixed formations, which were not conducive to command. To this end, the two spent a lot of money before the war to build a lot of strong fortifications around Wuhan, planning to use the fortifications to exhaust Jiang Jun and then annihilate them. Tao Jun, who had always prided himself on being a famous general in the Northern Expedition, was full of confidence in his strategy, and when He Jian of Hunan came to ask if he needed support, he refused.
Lured by Gui Jun, Jiang's right army quickly advanced to the outskirts of Wuhan, and everything seemed to be going according to plan, but then Li Mingrui decided to act. On 4 April, in the name of inspecting the front, he summoned officers above the 1st Division of the 7th Army and announced that they would move to a safe area and let Jiang Jun, Hu and Tao slowly fight to exhaust. Everyone applauded and agreed, and several regimental leaders loyal to Li and Bai did not dare to oppose it. That night, the 1st Division of the Gui Army hastily withdrew from the front line, and yang Tenghui and Yin Chenggang's 2nd and 3rd Divisions also slipped away, which caused the flanks of Hu and Tao's other troops to be completely exposed.
Fifth, not a single shot was fired and the entire army was destroyed
After learning that the 7th Army had defected, Hu Zongduo and Tao Jun were shocked, and in order not to let the troops be counter-encircled, they could only withdraw from Wuhan in a hurry, plus the 12th Army that returned to the division from the front line, Hu and Tao still had a total of more than 100,000 troops in the hands of five armies. Chiang Kai-shek was overjoyed to hear that the Gui army had withdrawn, and personally led a regiment into Wuhan on a warship, while the other Chiang kai-shek troops had not yet entered the city.
The Gui army retreated west to the city of Exisha by steamship, and the generals had different opinions, some advocated entering Sichuan to establish a new base area, and some suggested that they should kill at all costs and go back to Nanjing, but Hu Zongduo could not make up his mind, so he went to Xia Wei in Yichang for consultation. At this time, Chiang Kai-shek's envoy to persuade him to surrender had arrived, and Tao Jun, who had lost his fighting spirit, did not consult with Hu Zongduo and signed a telegram on Hu, Tao, and Xia Xiaye.
The gunboat Yongsui was launched in 1929
When Hu Zongduo returned and heard that Tao Jun had issued the Shimono ElectricIon, he couldn't help but be furious, pulled out his pistol and threw it on the table and asked: "When electricity is energized, why is it still called Commander-in-Chief Jiang?" Tao Jun was scared into a cold sweat. Hu Zongduo and Tao Jun each took 100,000 severance pay and went to Hong Kong by warship, and never participated in military and political affairs again. Before leaving, Tao Jun loaded the unpaid 18th Army salary into his pocket and made a windfall.
After the surrender of the 18th, 19th, and 50th Armies, their generals still secretly contacted Hu Zongduo in Hong Kong, and when Chiang Kai-shek found out, he simply disarmed all three armies and dismissed them. The 12th and 56th Armies performed slightly better, and were reorganized and sent to encircle and suppress the Red Army. Because he had been secretly in contact with Chiang Kai-shek, he finally retained the position of chairman of Hunan Province and became an old rival of the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army for the next six years. At this point, the Two Lakes region, which Li Zongren and Bai Chongxi had painstakingly operated for more than a year, was completely annexed by Chiang Kai-shek.