Introduction: In our conventional perception, the Eighth Route Army and the New Fourth Army are always poorly equipped. This is always highlighted in many film and television works, and then shows how our army is resourceful to deal with enemy forces with far greater equipment advantages than ours. Because the weak defeat the strong, it is more attractive than the suppression of firepower, and it can better reflect the strategic wisdom of our army. In fact, there is a misunderstanding in this understanding, and the strength of our army was indeed not very good during the period of land reform and the period of the War of Resistance, but in the three major battles, the equipment of the elite units of our army was no less than that of the national army, which was most obvious in the Northeast Field Army.
01
In the early days of the Red Army, it was indeed relatively weak, and there was a shortage of guns and ammunition in the troops. There is even a saying in the folk that our Marshal He Long, because of the lack of weapons and equipment in the troops, finally took the two kitchen knives from his family to participate in the revolution and carried out the early armed struggle. The authenticity of the legend is somewhat doubtful, but it also reflects the lack of equipment of the Red Army from the side. The Red Army lacked relatively large equipment factories, not to mention other military enterprises, and the Red Army, which could not achieve self-sufficiency in weapons, made everything simple, and many soldiers took large knives and spears to the battlefield in the early stages, relying on seizing the enemy's weapons to arm themselves.
Some scholars have specifically studied the comparison of the number of equipment of the Red Army and the Nationalist Army in the early stage of the End of the War of Resistance Against Japan. Regardless of the quality and type of weapons, just the quantity, after the end of the War of Resistance, our Party officially announced that it was equipped with 370,000 guns. In the scholar's study, it was pointed out that the number of weapons equipped by the Communist Party at that time should be around 300,000, which was still a patchwork. Most of them were confiscated guns from japan's defeated troops, and there were also some civilian-made and imperfect earthen guns and artillery, because there were still data that were relatively confidential and difficult to verify, and these quantities basically coincided with official data.
The timing of the rapid expansion of our army was at this time when it advanced into the northeast after the end of the War of Resistance. As an old heavy industrial base, the northeast is rich in mineral resources, and the Japanese established many military manufacturing plants during the occupation, which is a piece of fat. Some scholars believe that after entering the northeast, the Red Army harvested 250,000 guns, which is really a charcoal in the snow.
02
In addition to weapons and equipment, people are also an important factor in war. When it comes to weapons, we are still inferior to the Nationalist army, which received most of the Japanese materials and American aid, but why did we win the war? It also has to be the core element - the existence of people.
Our elite Northeast Field Army is an invincible iron army, and the discipline and will of the iron army are incomparable to those of the national army. The northeast field army has a very deep foundation, and there are both veteran soldiers who have participated in the revolution since the Jinggangshan period, personnel from the Eighth Route Army on the other side of the Yellow River, and the New Fourth Army in the water towns of Jiangnan, as well as many poor people who joined the army during the period of land reform. These turned-over peasants saw that the party was bent on serving the people, so they compared their hearts to their hearts, and they also joined the army with all their hearts to the party.
And this group of soldiers from all over the country, in this unfamiliar place, clashed hard with the elite of the Kuomintang army. This magical force can always be quickly corrected after the great war, quickly replenishing new forces, digesting and absorbing captured booty, after all, these things can only be used by those who can use and should be used, and can form combat effectiveness.
03
In early 1945, after the establishment of the Northeast Field Army, it was reorganized and divided into six squares against the enemy. During this period, the Kuomintang and the Communist Party had constant small frictions in the northeast region, but there was no real large-scale exchange of fire. Our Party is aware that peace is unlikely to be achieved in the northeast and that the two sides will certainly engage in large-scale battles, so we are also actively preparing for war.
At the beginning of 1946, the Northeast Field Army was reorganized again, the main force was under the direct command of the four major military regions, and the columns were reorganized, and the number of the reorganized Northeast Field Army reached 340,000 people. The Kuomintang also continued to increase its personnel at this time, and in May also increased the number of troops to 310,000, and the two sides continued to fight, and the Northeast Field Army won successive victories, withstood the test of war, and quickly relied on arsenals and captured booty to enrich itself.
In just two or three years, by August 1948, there were three classes per platoon, and each class had twelve people. In terms of equipment, it was also achieved that each company had at least three light machine guns, and at least six in August. The battalion headquarters had three heavy machine guns, and each division headquarters established its own heavy artillery battalion. In contrast, the Kuomintang troops were plagued by problems, and the phenomenon of internal corruption and short pay was serious; the combat strength of the Nationalist 74th Division, which was fighting in the northeast during this period, was inferior to that of a column of the Northeast Field Army, and the number of mortars, heavy artillery, and light machine guns was less than that of a column in Dongye, and naturally it was repeatedly defeated.
The Kuomintang fought in the northeast for three years, both sides were elite, and the Nationalist army once occupied the advantage, occupying most of the northeast. However, the Northeast Field Army is not a generalist, and this unit that truly serves the people has the support of the masses. After the next three major battles were fought, the number and equipment of a column (army) in Dongye directly exceeded that of the Nationalist army and a US ordnance army. Such a people's army, tempered by iron and blood, has no reason to be invincible.