The ace of the Nationalist army, the Steel Army, completely disappeared in the First World War, and the commander became the only captured commander to be executed in the Liberation War
In the summer of 1949, Siye fought with Bai Chongxi Hengbao, and the two armies of the 7th and 48th Armies that Bai Chongxi started fought hard for 4 days and were annihilated. After this battle, Bai Chongxi's main force has been lost, and the general trend has gone.
However, Bai Chongxi was not a person who easily accepted defeat, and after the loss of the army, he was still not satisfied, and held a military and political conference in Guilin to rebuild the 7th Army, which was known as the steel army. The commander of the army was Li Benyi, the former commander, Ma Zhanhong, the deputy commander, and Jiang Tang, the chief of staff. Although the combat effectiveness of the new 7th Army was much weaker than before, the local security regiments that had been added were all natives of Guangxi, and they fought like monkeys, so their strength was still there, and they were still Bai Chongxi's elite.
The rebuilt 7th and 48th Armies remained under the command of Zhang Gan, commander of the 3rd Corps.
As soon as the 7th Army was rebuilt, the Siye and Erye armies liberated Guangdong and then moved to the guangxi border. On November 25, 1949, Zhang Gan's 3rd Corps and Lu Daoyuan's 11th Corps "advanced" to luoding, Xinyi, Maoming, and Huaxian according to Bai Changchang's plan, and Bai Chongxi was ready to prevent the communist army from liberating Guangxi again as he had prevented the Long March Red Army from entering Guangxi 20 years earlier. However, with the passage of time, the Gui family is no longer so lucky. As soon as Zhang Gan launched his troops, he crashed into the knife edge of the Erye Chen Geng Corps.
The "fierce general" Li Benyi led the 7th Army from the north to Maoming to attack. At 9:00 a.m. on the morning of the 27th, in the Baowei area of XinyiNan, a battle was "actively" launched against the 15th Army of the Erye Army and a total of 5 divisions of the 14th Army. Li Benyi hoped to once again play the courage of the "steel army" of that year, and the officers and men from the security regiment dodged the rain of bullets and attacked upwards, as agile as rabbits, and as soon as the People's Liberation Army did not pay attention, they came out of the grass and charged forward. In the fierce battle, some bullets ran out, and they did not change the magazine, and they "wrestled" when they hugged the PLA. The 15th Army, known as the "Chitose Army", did not die in the later Battle of Shangganling, and this time the political commissar of a certain regiment, Tian Geng, was killed by them in a chaotic battle. When Li Ben saw his men so brave, he screamed wildly: "Tell Chen Geng to taste the power of the Guangxi soldiers!" However, these Guangxi soldiers did not let him say "medium", and after attacking for more than 5 hours, they still did not break through the positions of the 15th Army, and as a result, as soon as the brute force passed, they were completely discouraged. In the future, how Li Benyi "drives" again, they can't beat the spirit, they can't cheer up. Li Benyi had no choice but to obediently order a temporary attack.
Who knew that the two sides were deadlocked until 3 p.m., and the 3rd Division of the 15th Army suddenly launched a counterattack at the same time. The 7th Army stubbornly resisted, still unable to do so, and after 3 hours, it was finally in a big mess and forced to flee westward. Bai Chongxi hastily deployed more than 10 aircraft to cover, and the remnants of the 7th and 48th Armies were able to stabilize their positions and retreat to Bobai, but his so-called "southern offensive" collapsed, and he could no longer stop the PLA's march into Guangxi. Chen Geng's army followed the butts of the various armies of the 3rd Corps in a split-circuit pursuit, and wherever there were deserters, they would chase after them. When Liu Zhanhua, deputy commander of the 134th Regiment of the 15th Army, pursued to a certain place southeast of Luchuan with the vanguard 3rd Battalion, it was already dark and he was preparing to stop cooking, when he suddenly saw many flashlights on the mountain beams in front of him shaking, went to the local villagers to inquire, and replied:
"It's the White Army that retreated at dusk."
Deputy Commander Liu was overjoyed: "Good! They can't get out! ”
The compatriot said, "Their troops are big, and I'm afraid that you people can't deal with this." ”
"Don't be afraid!"
Liu Zhanhua ordered the 3rd Battalion to detour up in two ways, and rushed to "bring" the fallen 2nd Battalion up. When the 2nd Battalion ran up, Liu Zhanhua said, "Touch it!" As soon as the 3rd Battalion fired their guns, the enemy troops who played flashlights were all blocked into the ravine and shouted: "Surrender your guns and don't kill!" "The officers and men of the ravine all threw their guns and took prisoners. Deputy Commander Liu asked, the original 7th Army Headquarters Guard Battalion and logistics heavy company.
At dusk on the 30th, the 382nd Regiment of the 128th Division of the Siye 43rd Army pursued Su Liwei, which was only 40 miles from the county seat of Bobai County. The regimental commander Zhang Shijie learned that the enemy's 3rd Corps Corps headquarters and commander Zhang Gan were living in Bobai City, and decided to attack Bobai County at night and capture Zhang Gan alive. He approached Wang Dongbao, commander of the 127th Division, and asked for coordination. Commander Wang immediately said, "I order the 379th Regiment to run forward and rush to Su Liwei to strengthen your regiment." ”
That night, the 382nd Regiment took the 7th Company of the 3rd Battalion as the vanguard, led by the battalion commander Li Shuhua, and followed by Zhang Shijie and the main force of the regiment led by the division political commissar Song Weisu. The whole regiment marched for two hours, and when it was inserted into the city of Bobai County, it was already midnight, the sky was very dark, and I couldn't see my five fingers. When Commander Li led the 7th Company into the city, the 7th Army of the defenders in the city regarded them as "their own people" and asked without hurrying: "Which part of you are?" ”
"Own people." Lu Fushan, deputy company commander of the 7th Company, replied cleverly, "The 58th Army." ”
"What are you doing when the 58th Army retreats to our side?" The other party's vigilance is still quite high.
"On the orders of Commander Bai, help you to stop the communist army." Where does Commander Zhang live? We have an emergency to report to him. ”
"The library in the southeast of the city!"
Lu Fushan and more than 100 other people went south along the street, then turned southeast to the front of the library. Because there were too many people in Lufu Mountain, it aroused the vigilance of the sentries. The officer took a flashlight and looked at the soldier behind Lu Fushan, and exclaimed, "No, communist army!" The communists are in the city! ”
This shout alarmed the head of the corps operations department, and he hurriedly ran out of the house and shouted loudly: "Live hell, where is the communist army?" ”
As soon as the words landed, a PLA soldier rushed forward and dropped his gun, and the other soldiers rushed up, and without spending a single shot, they surrendered the officers and men of the 3rd Corps. These actions woke up Commander-in-Chief Zhang Gan, who was sleeping in the backyard, and threw a tantrum at the staff officer next to him in annoyance: "There are still 4 armies in front of us, and the communist army is still 180 miles away. ”
But at this time, the communist army had already pounced on the backyard where he lived, and the figure outside the door had appeared, and Zhang Gan panicked and went under the bed. The guards slammed the door shut. The warriors couldn't open the door. Commander Zhang Shijie came over and ordered the bazooka to be used to break the door. Two flashes of fire flashed, and the gate was blown out of a large hole. Lu Fushan rushed into the house in thick smoke, shot a few shots at the roof, and shouted: "Zhang Gan come out quickly, or he will blow up this house!"
Zhang Gan saw that the disaster could not be avoided, and he crawled out from under the bed, raised his hands, and said, "Brother surrender, brother surrender!" ”
"Who is brother with you?" A warrior shouted.
Subsequently, he was escorted to the regimental commander Zhang Shijie, who was kind and ordered the guards: "Move him a chair." ”
As soon as he sat down, his broken face was still bleeding from the bottom of the bed, and Commander Zhang called a military doctor to bandage his wounds, and after he finished this pass, he said solemnly: "As you have heard of our army's policy, for the enemy who lays down his weapons and automatically disarms, no matter how big or small, he will be lenient and ensure personal safety." ”
Zhang Gan immediately said: "I order the armies of our corps to quickly lay down their weapons and surrender to your army." ”
Immediately, he flew the dragon and drew a phoenix, drew up a telegram and handed it to Commander Zhang, saying: "Just give this to my subordinates." ”
Zhang Gan was captured, and the various armies of the 3rd Corps were leaderless and suddenly chaotic. However, Zhang Gan's surrender warrant was issued, and Li Benyi and others still refused to surrender. On the 2nd, the three armies of the 14th, 15th, and 43rd Armies of the People's Liberation Army simultaneously launched a fierce attack on the besieged enemy in Bobai City. At 3 p.m., most of the 7th, 48th, and 126th Armies were annihilated, and the remnants were scattered in the mountains between Luchuan and Bobai. But the experienced Li Ben repeatedly escaped from the encirclement. A few days later, on December 16, he and the remnants ran into the 363rd Regiment of the 121st Division of the 41st Army of the Communist Army at the town of Liuchen in Pingnan. This time, the remnants of the 7th Army were completely wiped out and disappeared.
The military commander Li Benyi finally did not succeed in escaping this time. He was captured alive and mixed with captives, but was quickly identified.
After Li Benyi was captured alive, he was sent to the Liu Family Garden in Hankou, Hubei Province, where the Headquarters of Siye is located, for discipline. One day, Commander Chen Yi of Sanye suddenly sent a telegram asking Lin Biao to transfer Li Benyi, who had committed the most heinous crimes, to the Military Justice Department of the Northern Anhui Military Region stationed at Liu Gongci In Hefei for detention.
It turned out that during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, Li Ben was the commander of the 171st Division and the commissioner of eastern Anhui, and he followed Li Pinxian to oppose communism and frantically slaughtered the New Fourth Army and the revolutionary masses in Anhui. After the outbreak of the civil war, when he led the 7th Army to attack our Huainan base area, he also killed local armed and revolutionary masses in Dingyuan, Fengyang, Jiashan and Feidong, with a total number of 30,000 people before and after, which can be described as a crime. Therefore, the masses in eastern Anhui and Huainan demanded that the murderous demon king be liquidated. On March 5, 1951, the Anhui North People's Court held a 10,000-person conference in Hefei Nursery Square. Chen Yuanliang, president of the Northern Anhui People's Court, presided over the meeting, and Huang Yan, political commissar of the Northern Anhui Military Region, deputy political commissar, and director of the Northern Anhui Administration, and other party, government, and military leaders attended the meeting. At the meeting, the Dingyuan County People's Complaint Regiment accused Li Benyi of his crimes, and the army representatives also listed his crimes, and finally the AnhuiBei People's Court pronounced a verdict in court sentencing Li Benyi, the commander of the Kuomintang army, who had committed the most heinous crimes, to death and immediately executed him. After the public judgment meeting, Li Benyi was put into a torture car and shot on the spot at the wall of the mass grave.