Written by: Jia Kekuan Jia Yong
It was not until the volunteers fought on the 38th Parallel that Zhou Enlai endured grief and wrote a letter to Mao Zedong to report: On November 25, 1950, American warplanes bombed the headquarters of the Volunteer Army, and Mao Anying was killed. The telegram sent by Peng Dehuai has been suppressed by Zhou Enlai for more than a month...
Mao Zedong and his eldest son Mao Anying
This is the second New Year's Day of New China.
After the snow, the morning sun first appeared. The radio waves of the Central People's Radio will spread the People's Daily editorial on the first day of the new year to all directions --
"The heroic fighting of the People's Volunteers in Korea for more than two months proves that even in the absence of aircraft, tanks and few cannons, the 'most powerful' imperialist army can be defeated ... Therefore, when we entered 1951, although the imperialist aggression against us had not stopped, we were confidently facing the bright future! ”
In this New Year's Day editorial entitled "Consolidating Our Great Motherland Under the Banner of Great Patriotism," Chairman Mao Zedong personally revised 9 places. The stirring words are like the surging passion of battle in the hearts of the volunteer soldiers.
At this moment, the third battle has been fought for 13 and a half hours. In the snow, thousands of volunteers broke through the 38th Line guarded by 200,000 or 300,000 "United Nations Troops" and South Korean Troops with thunderous momentum.
The third battle, the brave attack of the volunteer army
10th Floor, Imperial Hotel, Tokyo, Japan, Office of the Commander-in-Chief of the United Nations Army. MacArthur was taken aback by reports of the Volunteers' third campaign. He could not imagine that the Chinese army would once again launch a massive offensive battle after only one week of a brutal battle. Also, it is in the case of support away from the rear.
The casualty figures of the second battle are on MacArthur's desk: in this battle, the "United Nations Army" paid the price of 36,000 casualties and captured, including 24,000 American troops; more than 1,000 American artillery, more than 3,000 cars, more than 200 tanks and armored vehicles were destroyed or captured by the Volunteers... The insults in the United States and the criticism of international public opinion made MacArthur, a five-star general with the aura of "God of War" on his head, fall into a low point almost overnight.
MacArthur knew that compared with the U.S. military, the volunteer army was not only too disparate in weapons and equipment, but also had a world of difference in logistics. His soldiers received 3 Cans of the Meat Series and 3 Cans of the Biscuit Series with a net weight of 227 grams per day. The former is mainly meat, including meat, vegetables and other collocations; the latter is mainly biscuits, including candy and coffee, cocoa powder or lemon powder and other instant drinks... It also comes with chewing gum, chocolate, matches, cigarettes, napkins and more. Even so, his 1st Marine Division, dressed in thick duck down suits, still suffered frostbite at Chosin Lake with more than 7,000 wounds, not to mention the lack of food and clothing for the Chinese army.
The bone-chilling water could not stop the brave volunteers
MacArthur concluded with the intuition of a military man that if his "Christmas Offensive" was crushed by the Chinese— the U.S. Army suffered the "greatest defeat" ever, the Chinese army would certainly suffer heavy losses. MacArthur did not want his name to be destroyed in the Korean battlefield. He urgently recruited The Deputy Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army, Ridgway, from home to replace Walker, commander of the Eighth Army, who had rolled over and died during the rout of the Second Campaign, in order to save the battlefield as soon as possible. The Truman administration was also unwilling to suffer a crushing defeat at the hands of the young New China, declaring a "national emergency" and making the American people "make any necessary sacrifices" for the Korean War, while at the same time playing a conspiracy at the United Nations to talk about the real war in an attempt to buy time, expand armaments, and make a comeback.
All this naturally could not escape Mao Zedong's torch-like gaze. Even during the Second Campaign, Mao Zedong was keenly aware that with the bankruptcy of the US military's plan to make a quick decision, the contradictions between the United States and its servant countries would become sharper, and the anti-war sentiment in the United States would become even higher. In this context, only by taking advantage of the victory and giving the opponent a fatal blow can it be possible to completely force the enemy to the negotiating table - otherwise, once the opponent can breathe, with the strong war mobilization ability of the United States, Britain and other countries, the volunteer army will inevitably face greater battlefield pressure.
The chaotic clouds are still calm. Whether in adversity or good times, Mao Zedong, who had been in the war for a long time, had long since lost his temper. On New Year's Day 1930, when the "Zhumao" Red Army was no more than 10,000 people, Mao Zedong saw the prospect of "showing the red flag like a picture"; on New Year's Day in 1949, the dawn of victory in the Liberation War was coming, and Mao Zedong issued a call to "Carry the Revolution to the End" and warned the whole party not to be the farmer who pitied the poisonous snake in the ancient Greek parable. In the second campaign to resist the United States and aid Korea, the "United Nations Army" had been defeated and retreated 300 kilometers, and Pyongyang, which had fallen for 49 days, had returned to the hands of the Korean people, and Mao Zedong still needed a new victory to consolidate and stabilize the battlefield situation.
During the new year, the radio waves between Zhongnanhai and the Korean front were particularly dense, and a telegram pointed directly to a target: the 38th line!
It is advisable to chase the remaining bravely after the poor. What Mao Zedong pursued, in addition to military victory, was also political initiative. The reason why he was determined to win this war of founding the country was to use the just war to lay the foundation for the peace of the new republic and let the world re-understand a different China.
From the beginning of the first campaign on October 25, 1950, to the end of the second campaign on December 24, the hungry and cold volunteer army had been fighting in the vast snow of the Korean Peninsula for two months, but Mao Zedong firmly believed that the army that had followed him from the Long March, from the War of Resistance, and from the battlefield of the War of Liberation had the strength and confidence to deal another heavy blow to the enemy. This kind of strength comes from the bloodiness of the volunteer army, and it also comes from the motherland behind them.
That winter, almost every city in northern China would emit a faint mixed scent in the evening, where every household was making fried noodles for the volunteer army ahead. Zhou Enlai, the premier of the State Council, who has been taking care of every opportunity for several days, also appeared in the queue of fried noodles.
On December 26, 1950, the 56-year-old Ridgway hurried to the Korean battlefield. The U.S. military leadership added a title of commander-in-chief of the "United Nations Army" ground forces to the new Commander of the Eighth Army, and the U.S. Tenth Army was also assigned to the Eighth Army. At the beginning of his tenure, Ridgway flew to Tokyo to meet MacArthur. Ridgway asked, "Do you have any objections to the immediate launch of the offensive after I take office?" MacArthur patted Ridgway on the shoulder and said, "The Eighth Army is yours, Matthew!" Do whatever you think is good! He reminded Ridgway: "The U.S. troops retreating from the Cheongcheon River are holding the area along the 38th Parallel, and the troops are tired and morale is not high." ”
The American soldiers who fled in a hurry
Sure enough, when the ambitious Ridgway inspected his troops, he suddenly found that his mood was far colder than the harsh winter in North Korea—the US Eighth Army, which had suffered heavy losses from the volunteer army, had been overshadowed by a thick psychological shadow. Li Qiwei sadly admitted: "This is an army that has lost confidence in itself and its commanders, and it is not clear what it is doing... Every command post I have inspected gives me the same feeling, a loss of confidence and morale. ”
In desperation, Ridgway had to abandon the plan to immediately turn to the offensive, and quickly deployed 13 divisions and 3 brigades for defense, in an attempt to prevent the volunteers from continuing to advance south. Ridgway also played a mental eye, deploying 8 South Korean divisions on the front line and placing the American and British troops on the second line so that they could attack and defend and retreat at any time. However, what Ridgway did not expect was that his basic defensive line from the Jinjiang River in the west to the east coast had just been deployed, and the artillery fire of the volunteer army began with flying snowflakes.
At 17:00 on December 31, 1950, the Volunteers launched the third campaign, which the Americans called the "Chinese New Year's Eve Offensive.". The three corps of the regrouped Korean People's Army threw themselves into battle, and the Chinese and North Korean armies finally achieved unified command in this campaign.
Dusk is bloody and freezing. In the eyes of American writer John Tolan, the Korean War was far more brutal than the Second World War he had experienced, and the Chinese Volunteer Army was far tougher than the soldiers he had seen on the battlefields of Europe. In "The Long Battle: The Korean War through the Eyes of the Americans," he wrote: "The only antifreeze measure of the Chinese soldiers was to paste their feet with lard and beef and sheep plate oil to prevent frostbite, but they showed the most incredible courage and willpower in the history of human warfare." Hundreds of thousands of officers and soldiers trekked through the snowy glaciers on foot in the freezing cold of minus 20 degrees Celsius and through the sea of bullet fire..."
During the Republic of China, Ridgway, who had served as a deputy company commander in the 15th Infantry Regiment of the US Army stationed in Tianjin, obviously did not realize that the new Chinese army was so fearless, and still less did he expect that the "United Nations Army" and the South Korean Army were so afraid of the volunteer army. However, within a day and night, the First and Second Divisions of South Korea collapsed completely, and the First and Second Armies of North America on the Han River were in danger of being in a backwater battle. Ridgway, who had just sent MacArthur a New Year's greeting card on New Year's Day morning, was "deeply shocked" to see the scene: "I tried to stop it, but the fleeing truck flashed past me without slowing down." I had never felt this way before, and I prayed to God not to witness such a plot again. Alexander Bevin, a historian of the American army, wrote: "The Eighth Army has retreated like a bird of fright, south of the 38th Line, to the banks of the Icy Linjin River south of Kaesong in the west... The initiative is already completely in the hands of Chinese. ”
The Chinese and North Korean armies occupied Seoul
On 2 January, Ridgway ordered the abandonment of Seoul. Before retreating, he left Peng Dehuai with the following passage on the wall of his office: Greetings to the commander of the Chinese army.
It was also on this day that Zhou Enlai endured grief and reported a message that could no longer be concealed to Mao Zedong: On November 25, 1950, American warplanes bombed the headquarters of the Volunteer Army, and Mao Anying was sacrificed -- the telegram sent by Peng Dehuai had been suppressed by Zhou Enlai for more than a month, and this telegram of less than 30 words, Peng Dehuai wrote for more than an hour: "Today, the General Headquarters of the Volunteer Army was bombed by enemy aircraft, and Comrade Mao Anying was unfortunately sacrificed. ”
Mao Zedong was silent for a long time, until he finished smoking the second cigarette, and then he let out a sigh: "Alas, war, there must be casualties, it doesn't matter, who let him be Mao Zedong's son..."
Two days later, the volunteers occupied Seoul. After another 4 days, the third battle ended. During the battle, the Chinese and North Korean armies annihilated 19,000 enemy troops, of which the volunteer army annihilated 12,000 enemy. At this point, the volunteer army won three battles and three victories, completely turning the tide of the Korean war.
Ridgway later became the most difficult opponent of the volunteer army, but at this moment, he had to accept the reality in front of him.
Since the volunteer army crossed the Yalu River, international public opinion has constantly asked questions: The difference in national strength between China and the United States is huge, and what is the new China, which has just stood up from the ruins, relying on to resist the powerful United States? It is equally difficult for American soldiers on the Korean battlefield to understand: in the face of bombs, napalm and rockets in the air, in the face of the fire of tanks and howitzers on the ground, chinese soldiers who "attack wave after wave like a tide in the sound of sharp military trumpets and whistles" can calmly and calmly charge at death.
Perhaps, from the 1951 People's Daily New Year's Day editorial personally revised by Mao Zedong, it is not difficult to find the answer, that is-
Consolidate our great motherland under the banner of great patriotism!
January 1, 1951 People's Daily first page
Source: The song flew over eight thousand miles