The Battle of Huaihai in 1948 was the most difficult of the three strategic decisive battles in the later stages of the Liberation War. On the one hand, the total strength of our army is only more than 600,000 people, which is 200,000 less than the nationalist army; on the other hand, before this battle, the nationalist army had already experienced the defeat of the Liaoshen Campaign, and there was no way to retreat in the north, and a decisive battle had to be fought, so our army faced greater difficulties. In fact, in the Battle of Huaihai, the casualties of our army reached more than 130,000 people, which exceeded the sum of the two major battles of the Pingjin Campaign and the Liaoshen Campaign, and was a veritable fierce battle.
Strictly speaking, the Battle of Huaihai was a particularly large-scale battle, and its interior can be divided into multiple battles, which are called three stages in historiography: the first stage is the Battle of Nianzhuang, the second stage is called the Battle of Shuangduiji, and the third stage is the Battle of Chen Guanzhuang, which finally annihilates Du Yuming's clique. In chronological order, the three stages are not completely arranged along the timeline order, but have a certain degree of intersection.
For example, in the second phase of the Double Stacking Campaign, the Central Plains Field Army was mainly responsible, and the East China Field Army provided manpower and fire support. However, the enemy Huang Wei Corps in this battle was strong and very stubborn, resulting in a relatively long battle, and although our army quickly surrounded and killed more than 100,000 enemies in the double pile, it had not yet decided the victory or defeat. In the absence of the complete end of the Battle of Shuangduiji, the main force of the East China Field Army led by Commander Su had already surrounded Nearly 300,000 people of Du Yuming's group in Chen Guanzhuang in early December 1948. That is to say, the second phase of the campaign has not yet ended, and the third phase has actually begun.
After Commander Su led his army to besiege nearly 300,000 soldiers and horses of Du Yuming's group, he did not rush to lead his army to attack and annihilate the enemy, but first called General Chen, who was far away at the Nakano Command, to report on the battle situation here. Who knew that after Mr. Chen picked up the phone, he changed his previous gentle attitude and did not let Commander Su report on the war situation, but preemptively said: You don't say it first, listen to me quickly.
When Commander Su heard General Manager Chen say this, he was stunned for a moment and did not understand what was going on. I only listened to What General Manager Chen said: It is difficult to fight the Huang Wei Corps here, they have formed a car defense line, our artillery is insufficient, and now we lack effective means to attack the stronghold! You also encountered a lot of difficulties in playing Huang Baitao before, but then you quickly advanced and ate each other at once, you quickly talk about what is the secret, give us a support.
When Commander Su listened, he understood What Boss Chen meant. He told Mr. Chen the secret of his previous attack: It turned out that the Huang Baitao Corps in The mill was also extremely stubborn, and there were 100,000 soldiers and horses itself, and Hua Ye was very difficult to fight. After research, Commander Su adopted the style of earthwork in the second half of the campaign. The day before, the troops were arranged to dig the tunnels and wait until they were close to the enemy before launching an attack, so that they could effectively break through the enemy's defense line, greatly reduce the casualties of Huaye officers and men, and finally successfully annihilated Huang Baitao's Seventh Corps.
Elder Chen was very happy to hear Commander Su's report, and quickly summoned Commander Liu and Political Commissar Deng from the side: Listen quickly, using the method of soil work industry can blast down Huang Wei's automobile defense line! I suggest that this style of play be conveyed to the columns immediately, and let them learn from HuaYe to see if this method can work. Liu Shuai was very much in favor, and immediately arranged various columns to study the play method introduced by Commander Su, and strived to use geotechnical excavation to break through the enemy's defense line.
Huang Wei held out for more than ten days, and was very uncomfortable with the central plains field army's sudden change of playing style and the use of geotechnical excavations to carry out explosive assaults, and soon the defensive line was disintegrated, Huang Wei himself was taken prisoner, the 12th Corps was completely destroyed, and the Central Plains Field Army captured a large number of weapons and equipment. Mr. Chen demanded that Huaye reinforcements leave their weapons and prisoners to Nakano, and huaye's columns immediately returned to their garrisons to supply them after completing their tasks. As a result, Nakano's strength quickly recovered.
Commander Su and General Chen were both the main commanders of the Third Field Army. In January of the following year, the Central China Field Army and Chen Laozong's Shandong Field Army were merged into the East China Field Army, and Chen Laozong served as the commander of the field army, responsible for the overall scheduling and overall management of the East China Field Army; and commander Su served as a deputy and was also in charge of military combat affairs. General Manager Chen had full trust and delegation of power to Commander Su, and the major battles fought by HuaYe were mainly commanded by Commander Su, who was known for his military skills.
In early 1948, the Central Committee made a decision to transfer Mr. Chen to the Central Plains Field Army as the first deputy commander and assist Liu Shuai. The main reason for this decision is that the two major combat units of the Central Plains Field Army and the East China Field Army need to coordinate in order to liberate the Jiangbei region as soon as possible; on the other hand, Commander Su's military ability has been fully proved that he can be qualified for such an important position as the military commander of the three fields.
However, after the central government issued the order, the commander of the millet was not willing to accept it. Because during the period of serving in the East China Field Army, although Commander Su's record was very outstanding, it was also inseparable from the support and help of General Manager Chen. For example, Xu Shiyou, a veteran general in the mountains, was once very unconvinced of Commander Su, and sometimes he would make a face-to-face confrontation and not cooperate with Commander Su's tactical arrangements; if it were not for General Chen "suppressing the field," many of Commander Su's good tactical intentions would not be easy to achieve, so Commander Su hoped that even if Commander Chen went to Nakano, he would continue to concurrently serve as the commander of the East China Field Army, and he would only serve as acting commander and acting political commissar.
After studying and accepting this proposal, The Central Military Commission accepted this proposal, and Chen Laozong concurrently held two important leadership positions, namely, commander of the East China Field Army and deputy commander of the Central Plains Field Army, while he himself worked with Commander Liu and Political Commissar Deng and worked at the Headquarters of the Central Plains Field Army.
Commander Su was one of the military commanders with the strongest command ability of our army during the Liberation War, and his contributions in the War of Liberation can be said to be comparable only to Lin Shuai of The Four Fields. When Nakano was struggling to find the art of breaking the enemy, Commander Su made a phone call and simply taught a few tactical tricks, which could help Nakano find a way to defeat the enemy and win, which showed how superb his military level was.
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