In the Battle of Menglianggu, the reorganized 74th Division, known as "one of the five main forces of the Nationalist Army", was completely destroyed, and Chiang Kai-shek's beloved general Zhang Lingfu was also killed, which fully exposed the intrigue within the Nationalist Army. At that time, the 74th Division was in the center of the front, with hundreds of thousands of friendly troops nearby, but few of them fully supported it, and most of them chose to passively sabotage in order to preserve their strength. In particular, the nearest 83rd Division was "standing by and watching" under the command of Li Tianxia. He only sent a company with a radio to approach the 74th Division pretending to be a 19th Brigade for cover, and ordered the 57th Regiment closest to the 74th Division to retreat at any time, which undoubtedly pushed Zhang Lingfu into the fire pit.
Therefore, the failure of Zhang Lingfu and the 74th Division was attributed to the ineffective rescue of the Nationalist army, especially Li Tianxia. After the Battle of Menglianggu, Chiang Kai-shek was furious and determined to investigate the matter thoroughly, and Li Tianxia bore the brunt of the punishment and was almost shot on the spot. So after this, where did Li Tianxia go? Let's move on.
As we all know, because of Li Tianxia's poor performance in the Battle of Menglianggu, Lao Jiang originally directly convicted him of a capital crime. But at this time, the internal corruption and darkness of the nationalist army, Li Tianxia found some connections, used money to make a point, stunned was released on bail, and continued to live a happy and happy life. Not long after, the front line of the Nationalist army was tight, and Li Tianxia was revived, serving as the commander of the 37th Army and the commander of the 73rd Army. On the battlefield of Pingtan, in the face of the powerful People's Liberation Army, Li Tianxia and the 73rd Army did not resist for long, and then secretly took a warship and fled to Taiwan.
Seeing that Li Tianxia, who "had not accomplished enough things and had more than enough failures," old Jiang Qi did not fight and put him and Li Yannian on death row, preparing to kill a hundred people. As soon as this news came out, those close friends in the army of "Er Li" began to intercede frequently and went to persuade Song Meiling. But the so-called "death penalty can be avoided, living crimes can not escape", Li Tianxia and Li Yannian were eventually sentenced to fixed-term imprisonment. It is worth mentioning that Li Tianxia also requested to "transfer to military service, wear crimes and make meritorious contributions," and came to the front line of Kinmen. At this time, Li Tianxia had long lost her real power, and the former prestige was gone.
In 1955, Li Tianxia abandoned the army to engage in business, but he did not have that brain, and soon even lost his old money. But Li Tianxia was generous, and in order to maintain his comfortable life, he even made up lies to cheat money everywhere. In the end, Li Tianxia was imprisoned, and his former wife Yue Jinghua also divorced him. In her later years, Li Tianxia had a difficult life and had to buy and cook by herself. On February 10, 1967, Li Tianxia passed away at the age of 60.