In July 1979, Su Yu went to Qingdao for recuperation and inspection, and he designated two people to accompany him, one of whom was a deputy director of the War History Research Department of the Academy of Military Sciences, named Wang Xixian.
Wang Xixian specialized in the history of the agrarian revolutionary war, and at this time had just been transferred to Su Yu's side to help write his memoirs, and then accompanied Su Yu for nearly 5 years, mastering a large number of first-hand accounts of Su Yu's dictations, of which he was deeply impressed by Su Yu's evaluation of the main force under his command.
It was on this trip to Qingdao that Su Yu personally told Wang Xixian that there were six first-class main columns under his East China Field Army, which were:
The 1st, 3rd, 4th, 8th, 9th, and 10th columns, of which the 10th column was slightly weaker, but could still be counted as the main force of the first class. The first five first-class main columns were on par with each other. The 1st and 4th columns fought well in the field, the 3rd, 8th, and 9th columns were good at attacking strong points, and the 10th columns were good at defending.
Su Yu referred to the huaye main column as the twelve column sequences after the shandong and central China field armies were unified and reorganized into the East China Field Army at the end of 1946, of which the commander of the 1st column was Ye Fei, who was later organized into the 20th Army; the commander of the 2nd column was Wei Guoqing, which was later organized into the 21st Army; the commander of the 3rd column was He Yixiang, who was later organized into the 22nd Army; the commander of the 4th column was Tao Yong, who was later organized into the 23rd Army; the commander of the 6th Column was Wang Bicheng, who was later organized into the 24th Army; the commander of the 7th Column was Cheng Jun, and later organized into the 25th Army The commander of the 8th Column was Wang Jian'an, later organized as the 26th Army; the commander of the 9th Column was Xu Shiyou, later organized as the 27th Army; the commander of the 10th Column was Song Shilun, later organized as the 28th Army; the commander of the 11th Column was Guan Wenwei, later organized as the 29th Army; the commander of the 12th Column was Chen Qingxian, later organized as the 30th Army; the commander of the 13th Column, Zhou Zhijian, later organized as the 31st Army.
What made people wonder was that su Yu's six first-class main columns in Huaye actually did not have the famous Wang Bicheng 6 columns. Throughout the liberation war, Huaye continued to appear the name of "Ye Wang Tao", and this "Ye Wang Tao" was Wang Bicheng's 6 columns, and Ye Fei's 1 column, and Tao Yong's 4 columns. In terms of fame and seniority, Wang Bicheng and Ye Fei and Tao Yong are on a par with each other.
Friends who know some military history, or those born before the 1970s, will have a deep impression of Huaye 6. A classic old movie "Red Sun" makes Huaye 6 Column deeply rooted in the hearts of the people, and the prototype of the Qi Yu Xuan Ang in the movie and the eighth route army commander Shen Zhenxin, who fought with the commander of the reorganized 74th Division, Zhang Lingfu, was Wang Bicheng, the commander of the 6 column.
In the movie, the military commander Shen Zhenxin pointed to Zhang Xiaofu, who had become a prisoner of Huaye but was stubborn, and said categorically:
"I tell you, we must eliminate the 74th Division"
。 Shen Zhenxin's actions and lines became a classic that children competed to imitate at that time.
The film "Red Sun" more objectively reflects the role played by the 6th Column in the annihilation of the reorganized 74th Division. The 6th Column attacked 120 kilometers in 48 hours to block the retreat of the reorganized 74th Division, and was the first to rush to Meng Lianggu and take out Zhang Lingfu's headquarters.
Looking at Su Yu's use of the 6th Column throughout the Liberation War, it is indeed surprising that this unit is often placed in the position of fighting a hard battle, and when summing up in the end, this unit with outstanding achievements is excluded from the main force.
First, there is no doubt that wang Bicheng was one of the three main forces under Su Yu's command in the beginning
Huaye 6 column is a unit that grew up with column commander Wang Bicheng, that is to say, the 6 column is Wang Bicheng.
Wang Bicheng was born in the Eyu-Anhui Red Fourth Front, and at the end of the Long March, he served as the deputy commander of the 89th Division of the Red 30th Army, the main force of the Red Fourth Front. The Red 30Th Army was later organized as the Western Route Army and collapsed in the Hexi Corridor, but fortunately Wang Bicheng left the Red 30th Army early to resist The Great Army, thus avoiding a catastrophe of life and death.
The characteristics of the Red Fourth Front are that they are brave in battle and are not afraid of death, and the commander of each battle must charge forward, and Wang Bicheng is also deeply branded with the Red Fourth Front, he fights like a tiger, and because he has a pair of big tiger teeth, he is laughed at
"Tooth Tiger"
。
In the spring of 1938, the 1st detachment of the New Fourth Army was established, with two regiments under its jurisdiction, and the members were several Red Army guerrilla units from Xiangganbian, Gansu and Guangdongbian, and northeastern Jiangxi, with the commander of the detachment being Chen Yi and the deputy commander being Fu Qiutao. On the day of the establishment of the 2nd Regiment, Wang Bichengcai, who graduated from the Kang University, hurried from Yan'an to Maoshan, Jiangsu Province, and his position was the chief of staff of the 2nd Regiment of the 1 Detachment, and the regimental commander at that time was Zhang Zhengkun, who was born in the Red Army. A few months later, Zhang Zhengkun was transferred to the chief of staff of the 1st detachment, and Wang Bichengcheng took over as the commander of the 2nd regiment.
After Wang Bicheng took over the 2nd Regiment, he fought many good battles and became a powerful fist in chen Yi's hands, he commanded the 2nd Regiment to fight Xinfeng, attack Jurong, and attack Dongwan, of which the battle of annihilating the enemy of Yanling was particularly famous.
On November 8, 1939, the Japanese army in Zhenjiang went to the Yanling area to carry out a "sweep", when this Japanese army returned through Danyang County, the Danyang independent detachment of the New Fourth Army was intercepted, and then the newly formed New Sixth Regiment of the New Fourth Army joined the battle group, but the two units were not strong in combat, that is, they did not annihilate the enemy in front of them, nor could they stop the enemy, but they fell into the encirclement of the reinforced Japanese army and the Japanese army in front of them.
At the critical moment, Wang Bicheng led 2 regiments to reach the outside of the village occupied by the Japanese army at a rapid speed, in order to reduce the casualties caused by the Japanese machine guns, Wang Bicheng, who was experienced in combat, ordered the grass pile to be lit, first blurred the vision of the Japanese machine gunners, and then rushed into the village with thick smoke to engage in close combat and white-knife warfare with the Japanese army, and after 30 hours of fierce fighting, the Japanese army was completely annihilated, killing 168 people below the japanese wucun brigade leader, taking 3 prisoners, capturing 4 light machine guns, 28 rifles, and 2 grenadiers, which was known as the "Yanling Victory" in military history. This great victory was praised by the Yan'an headquarters, and the 2 regiments were called "tiger regiments" by Chen Yi. Chen Yi changed Wang Bicheng even more
The nickname, titled more imposing
"King Tiger"
With the development of the New Fourth Army to northern Jiangsu, Wang Bicheng led 2 regiments across the river into northern Jiangsu, expanded into the 2nd column, and fought the Battle of Huangqiao together with Ye Fei's 1 column and Tao Yong's 3 column, and "Ye Wang Tao" also became Su Yu's three iron fists. The famous "Ye Wangtao" appeared in the battle history of the New Fourth Army and the East China Field Army, especially in southern Jiangsu, northern Jiangsu and Shandong, where "Ye Wangtao" fought one victory after another, which made the Japanese army and the Kuomintang army feel frightened.
After the Anhui Incident, the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Columns of the New Fourth Army in northern Jiangsu were organized into the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Brigades, with Ye Fei, Wang Bicheng, and Tao Yong as brigade commanders, respectively, under the command of Su Yu, commander of the 1st Division.
At the beginning of 1943, in accordance with the development strategy of the Central Military Commission and the New Fourth Army, in order to strengthen the base area in southern Jiangsu, Wang Bicheng led the 2nd Brigade to cross the Yangtze River to the south at the behest of Commander Chen Yi, and merged with the 16th Brigade in Jiangnan to form the new 16th Brigade.
When the new 16th Brigade was first established, it had only more than 5,000 men, and two months later it was attacked by Gu Zhutong's 12 regiments of about 20,000 troops, and as a result, under the command of Wang Bicheng and Jiang Weiqing, the New 16th Brigade not only successfully highlighted Gu Zhutong's heavy siege, but also annihilated more than 1,200 enemy troops.
After the victory of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, the new 16th Brigade was reorganized into the 1st Column of the Jiangsu-Zhejiang Military Region, and Wang Bi became the commander. At the beginning of 1946, the 1st Column was reorganized into the 6th Division of the New Fourth Army, with Tan Zhenlin concurrently serving as the division commander and political commissar, and Wang Bicheng and Jiang Weiqing serving as deputy division commanders and deputy political commissars respectively.
With the outbreak of the Liberation War in June 1946, the 6th Division of the New Fourth Army soon began its relationship with the reorganized 74th Division, one of the five main forces of the Kuomintang Army. Wang Bicheng's 6th Division and Zhang Lingfu's reorganized 74th Division fought three battles, resulting in 2 wins and 1 loss, but these 1 losses affected Wang Bicheng's military career.
Second, a narrow victory over Zhang Lingfu
Liu Zhi's 300,000-strong army attacked the Central Plains, the War of Liberation broke out in full swing, and the liberated areas on the east side of Chen Yi and Su Yu faced an attack of nearly 500,000 troops from 58 integrated brigades of the Kuomintang army.
The East China Liberated Area is composed of the Suwan Liberated Area and the Shandong Liberated Area, the Suwan Liberated Area is guarded by Su Yu's Central China Field Army, and the Shandong Liberated Area is guarded by Chen Yi's Shandong Field Army, with a total strength of 420,000 troops, of which only 130,000 are field troops.
Su Yu judged that the focus of the Kuomintang army's offensive against the Soviet-Anhui Liberated Areas was on The Soviet Union and Central China, so his plan was to first fight a few victorious battles on the inner line of Central Jiangsu and then turn to the outer line of Huainan to annihilate the enemy, because the inner line was rich in money and grain, and with the support of the people in the base areas, it was easy to annihilate the enemy, and once a few victorious battles were fought, annihilating one of the enemy's units had different effects on the morale and combat effectiveness of both the enemy and us, and then it was easy to turn to the outer line to annihilate the enemy.
As a result, Su Yu's internal strategy led him to fight seven battles and seven victories against the 120,000 Kuomintang troops in central Jiangsu with 30,000 troops, and the two main divisions that helped him in the great victory in central Jiangsu were the 1st Division, which he personally served as the commander of the division, and the 6th Division, which was presided over by deputy division commander Wang Bicheng and deputy political commissar Jiang Weiqing.
The 6th Division led by Wang Bicheng participated in five offensive and encirclement and annihilation battles of the Seven Battles of the Soviet Union and China, and the other two defensive battles of Hai'an and Shaobo were small in scale, so the 7th Column and the 10th Column, which were upgraded by local armed forces, were completed, and the main 1st Division and 6th Division did not participate.
When Su Yu achieved brilliant results in seven wars and seven victories in the Soviet Union, the situation in the Huainan Liberated Area near Central Jiangsu was very bad.
Zhang Lingfu led the reorganized 74th Division to occupy Huaiyin, the capital of the Central China Liberated Area.
Wang Bicheng took the 6th Division from Suzhong to Huaiyin for reinforcements, but when he arrived, Huaiyin had already fallen the day before, so he had to retreat with the 6th Division to shuyang to stand by.
Zhang Lingfu was a tough general of the Kuomintang, and three days after he captured Huaiyin, he carried forward the spirit of continuous combat and went out of Huaiyin to capture Huai'an, and at this point, the Lianghuai region, which was the heart of the liberated areas of central China, completely fell.
The fall of the Lianghuai region caused a serious blow to the morale of the central Chinese army and the common people, and the troops who had fought with the reorganized 74th Division even had a fear of the 74th Division, which was circulating in the army
"The reorganized 74th Division was more difficult to fight than the Japanese army in the War of Resistance."
In particular, the soldiers liberated from the Kuomintang army appeared
"Fear of the 74th Division"
Wang Bicheng did not believe in this evil, and he always wanted to compete with the reorganized 74th Division.
Wang Bicheng's opportunity came.
On October 22, 1946, Wang Bicheng, who was on standby in the Shuyang area, suddenly received an urgent telegram from Su Yu, asking him to immediately lead the 6th Division to Lianshui City and cooperate with the 1st Division and other troops to annihilate the reorganized 74th Division.
After the fall of the two Huai, only Lianshui, Funing, Yancheng, and Shuyang were left in the liberated areas of northern Jiangsu, and Lianshui City, which was close to the northeast of Huai'an, became the front line and gateway for these four counties and the Kuomintang army, and also became an important hub connecting Shandong and central Jiangsu, because Lianshui was further east to the sea, and once Lianshui was lost, The Soviet Union and Central Jiangsu would be separated from Shandong, and the rich Liberated Area of Central Jiangsu would fall behind enemy lines.
Lianshui City is 35 kilometers away from Huaiyin, only 30 kilometers away from Huai'an, located between the Abandoned Yellow River and the Salt River, there are three river embankments between the south of the city and the abandoned Yellow River, the first embankment is the Yellow River inner embankment, which is relatively low, the second embankment is a high and thick embankment, higher than the Lianshui City Wall, and the third embankment is a moat that is much lower than the second embankment. Such geographical characteristics make the second levee the key to defending Lianshui City, as long as the second levee is lost, Lianshui City is easy to lose.
Originally, Chiang Kai-shek wanted to transfer the reorganized 74th Division, which had made great achievements in battle, back to Nanjing for recuperation, but Zhang Lingfu took the initiative to ask Lianshui to fight. Zhang Lingfu wanted to hit Lianshui, not because of his dizziness, but because he saw two aspects that were beneficial to him:
1. At this time, the main forces of the Central China Field Army, the 1st Division and the 6th Division, were in the north of Subei, and there were only weak brigades near Lianshui City, such as the 10th Column, the 11th Column, and the 6th Brigade of Huainan, which were upgraded from local troops, and the strength of the troops was weak;
2, Lianshui City is too close to Zhang Lingfu's two Huai, his all-American weapons can arrive in 1 or 2 hours, and it is very easy to replenish, and the three levees of Lianshui City are nothing in front of the aircraft cannons.
There is a weakness in the national armament, that is, it is very expensive, and it is very difficult to replenish it in old China, which is inconvenient to transportation, and the combat effectiveness will decline sharply as the lines of communication are lengthened, which is one of the reasons why the Nationalist army with advanced US armaments and equipment is defeated by the New Fourth Army of the Eighth Route Army and even the People's Liberation Army, which is backward and equipped. Zhang Lingfu, who was very close to the two Huai supply sites, had no such difficulty in fighting Lianshui at all, and his beautiful weapons and equipment could fully exert his advantages, and he patted Chiang Kai-shek on the chest
"After fighting the last battle in northern Jiangsu, return to Nanjing."
On October 19, Zhang Lingfu led more than 30,000 troops of the 192nd Brigade of the reorganized 74th Division and the 28th Reorganized Division, and surrounded Lianshui City in three ways. Among them, the 57th Brigade of the 74th Division attacked Ziling on the East Road, the 51st Brigade attacked the South Gate of Lianshui in the middle, and the 58th Brigade attacked the West Gate of Lianshui along the narrow strip between the abandoned Yellow River and the Salt River on the West Road.
Zhang Lingfu's offensive was fierce and rapid, and the 10th Column, 11th Column, and 6th Brigade of Huainan, which were responsible for guarding Lianshui, could not resist on the periphery, causing Zhang Lingfu's 74th Division to attack Lianshui City on the 21st.
Zhang Lingfu's progress made Su Yu see the crisis in Lianshui, and on the one hand, he ordered the 11th Column to defend Lianshui City at all costs, and on the other hand, he transferred the 6th Division to quickly move south to be stationed near Lianshui City as a reserve.
After receiving the order, Wang Bicheng immediately led the 6th Division to the south in light armor, with a forced army to move toward Lianshui, and stood by near Lianshui City on time. On the evening of the 22nd, Zhang Lingfu's 51st Brigade broke through the first line of defense composed of the 15th Regiment of the 11th Column at the South Gate of Lianshui and began to launch a fierce attack on the second line of defense.
Su Yu saw the opportunity to encircle and completely annihilate the 74th Division.
As long as the defending 11th Column attracted the main force of the reorganized 74th Division on the second embankment, and then encircled it with the 1st and 6th Divisions, the reorganized 74th Division could be completely annihilated.
Wang Bicheng, who received Su Yu's urgent telegram, urgently led the 6th Division to support Lianshui, and he ordered the entire 6th Division to lightly equip and advance towards Lianshui in a forced march. At dawn on the 23rd, the 6th Division rushed to the north of Lianshui City. At this time, Wang Bicheng encountered a problem, Su Yu's urgent telegram asked Wang Bicheng to join forces with the 1st Division and other troops to annihilate the reorganized 74th Division, but did not instruct how to fight specifically.
Wang Bicheng did not know that a reinforced company of the reorganized 74th Division had broken through the second line of defense and entered the city, and the strategy he and the political commissar Jiang Weiqing agreed on was:
If there are no enemies in the city, go into the city to support, and if there are already enemies in the city, fight outside the city.
Wang Bicheng ordered Rao Shoukun, the commander of the 18th Brigade, to first take a cavalry squad into the city to find out the situation. Rao Shoukun met with Cheng Jun, commander of the 11th Column, and Zhao Qimin, the political commissar, and after finding out the situation, agreed that the 11th Column would continue to defend the city, and at dusk the 6th Division would break through the west gate, then go east along the street, and then turn south, pressing the enemy 51st Brigade at the south gate to retreat.
At dusk of the same day, the 6th Division launched an attack from the West Gate as promised, and at 21:00 p.m., the 53rd Regiment of the 18th Brigade, which was the vanguard of the 6th Division, and the 11th Column and 15th Regiment of the City joined forces, and then the two armies jointly launched a southward attack, annihilating the reinforced company of the 74th Division in the city, and driving all the enemy troops out of the city.
Under the combined onslaught of the 18th Brigade and the 11th Column, the 51st Brigade of the reorganized 74th Division was defeated and retreated to the first levee.
Wang Bicheng also urgently dispatched the 16th Brigade, and from the east, together with the 18th Brigade, launched an east-west attack on the first levee, using light and heavy machine guns and hand-to-hand combat to drive the enemy troops to the second levee.
At this time, the sky was already bright, and the day was beneficial to Zhang Lingfu's beautiful equipment.
Zhang Lingfu immediately concentrated all the 3 brigades on the front, and concentrated 100 artillery pieces, and launched a counterattack against the 6th Division in Lianshuicheng with the support of aircraft, but he was unable to break through the 6th Division's defense line after 8 consecutive attacks.
In the evening, Huaye's 1st Division and 13th Brigade arrived, and another counterattack drove the reorganized 74th Division out of three levees and compressed them to the river. Zhang Lingfu's 51st Brigade suffered heavy casualties, had to replace the 192nd Brigade of the Shangfei clan, and launched a fierce attack on Lianshui City during the day of the next day, the 6th Division and Huaye's various units firmly held their positions, and by night, Huaye's troops were in place and began to launch a comprehensive counterattack against the integrated 74th Division.
At this time, the reorganized 74th Division was exhausted, and su Yu's plan to annihilate the reorganized 74th Division was about to be realized, but Zhang Lingfu's sense of battlefield smell was very sensitive, and he felt the impending danger, and fled back to Huaiyin before the various units in Huaye were encircled.
Although Zhang Lingfu was defeated and retreated, the retreat in front of the enemy was also a technical task, and in the end Zhang Lingfu was able to retreat with his whole body, which also proved that his reorganized 74th Division was worthy of being one of the five main forces.
In this battle, Huaye annihilated more than 9,000 enemy troops, captured 15 artillery pieces, 150 light and heavy machine guns, and 6,924 long and short guns, of which the 6th Division had the largest number of enemy casualties, with more than 5,000 people.
This is Huaye's famous Battle I Lianshui, although this battle defeated the reorganized 74th Division, but the consumption of Huaye was also great, especially the 6th Division, the greatest achievements in battle, the largest consumption.
Although Hua Ye thwarted Zhang Lingfu's attempt to capture Lianshui, from the perspective of the entire strategy of the Liberation War, the Kuomintang army was still in the offensive, so Zhang Lingfu, who occupied Lianghuai, would not give up on Lianshui, who was close at hand, and a month later, in early December, Zhang Lingfu made a comeback.
Third, Zhang Lingfu once again attacked the east and the west
In response to Zhang Lingfu's renewed attack on Lianshui, Chen Yi and Su Yu were guarded by the 6th Division and the 6th Huainan Brigade, while Tan Zhenlin, commander of the 6th Division, was also with the 6th Division.
1 month ago, Zhang Lingfu's main attack on Lianshui was the south gate, this time Zhang Lingfu came to attack Lianshui again, and the strength of the troops increased by 1 brigade compared with the previous time, what kind of play will he adopt?
Tan Zhenlin, commander of the 6th Division, judged that Zhang Lingfu would still attack from the south gate, so he placed all the troops of the 6th Division south of Lianshui City, intending to use the favorable terrain of the south gate to block Zhang Lingfu's main force, and placed 2 regiments of the Huainan 6 Brigade at the west gate.
Tan Zhenlin is a political work cadre and a layman in the military, and his deployment is in the arms of Zhang Lingfu.
Of course, Zhang Lingfu did not know Tan Zhenlin's deployment, but he learned from the first failure, did not clarify the main direction of attack in advance, but launched an attack in the direction of the south gate with two brigades, and the main 3 brigades (the 51st and 58th brigades of the 74th Division and the 1st Division of the 7th Army) hid their whereabouts, waited near Lianshui City, and responded to the situation according to the situation.
Zhang Lingfu's two brigades attacked from 3 December and failed to break through the south gate until 14 December, but his goal had been achieved, and his 2 brigades effectively attracted all the main forces of the 6th Division.
That is, in the past few days, Wang Bicheng and Jiang Weiqing obviously felt that their strength was not strong from the enemy's offensive in front of them, and they realized that Zhang Lingfu's main offensive direction was not the southern front, but the sound of attacking the west from the east, and it was likely to break through from the western front, and they telegraphed Tan Zhenlin three times, asking for the key defense to be transferred to the western front, but the opinions of the two did not get Tan Zhenlin's attention.
As a result, on the day of the 14th, Zhang Lingfu's three main brigades suddenly appeared at the west gate, and with the cooperation of aircraft, they attacked fiercely, and soon broke through the first line of defense set up by the Huainan 6th Brigade.
At this time, Tan Zhenlin hurriedly ordered the 6th Division to cross the Yellow River at night from the abandoned Yellow River and quickly reinforce ximen. Wang Bicheng and Jiang Wei had made orders to reinforce Ximen early in the morning, and as soon as Tan Zhenlin's order arrived, Wang Bicheng personally led the 16th Brigade to go and arrived at noon on the 15th.
Although there were reinforcements from the 16th Brigade, Zhang Lingfu's 3 brigades were too strong in combat, and by dusk they had broken through many positions. In view of the seriousness of the situation, Wang Bicheng personally entered the city with the command organ to command, and he arranged a counterattack at night. Luo Weidao, the commander of the 16th Brigade, personally led the charge, and fought until midnight, finally repelling the enemy troops who had burst into the position.
Although the enemy army was repelled, but faced with a strong enemy of 3 brigades, the 16th Brigade and the 6th Huainan Brigade were still insufficient at this time, and Tan Zhenlin ordered the 18th Brigade of the 6th Division at the South Gate to return to reinforcements. Jiang Weiqing returned to the aid overnight after receiving the order, but due to the shortage of ships when crossing the Yellow River, it took 9 hours to complete the whole brigade, and when they arrived at the Dongguan of Lianshui City, it was already 9 o'clock the next day. At this time, the four roads in the southeast, southwest, and northwest of Lianshui City were all approached by enemy troops one after another, especially the enemy troops on the east road, and the main forces of the 6th Division were attracted to the west road and the south road, and launched a fierce attack on the east gate, and the progress was very fast.
Rao Shoukun, commander of the 18th Brigade, and Luo Guihua, chief of staff, who had come to reinforcements overnight, disregarded fatigue and led their troops to the east gate to block the attacking enemy, but they lost sight of each other, and the north gate and the west gate were again breached by the enemy.
The 16th Brigade had to engage in street battles with the enemy troops who had rushed into the city, and the development of the street battles meant that the loss of Lianshui City was irreparable. Wang Bicheng understood that at this time, he had to consider how to reduce losses as much as possible and strive to retreat from the whole body, so he ordered the 18th Brigade at the East Gate to return and alternately cover the withdrawal from Lianshui City with the 16th Brigade.
By about 13:00 p.m., the main force of the 6th Division finally withdrew from Lianshui, but the 2nd Battalion of the 53rd Regiment of the 18th Brigade that remained in the city to block the attack suffered heavy losses, except for one company that protruded, and most of the rest were killed.
Zhang Lingfu finally took Lianshui City, and he was full of ambition and took a group of staff to take a group photo under a seven-story pagoda in the west of the city.
Why are the 4th and 6th columns excluded from the first class main force?
After the Battle of Lianshui, Deputy Political Commissar Jiang Weiqing received a phone call from division commander Tan Zhenlin, and according to the orders of Commander Chen Yi, Wang Bicheng was to be removed from his post as deputy division commander, and Jiang Weiqing was appointed as the deputy division commander, and asked Jiang Weiqing himself to announce it to the regimental level.
It was a very strange appointment, without any paper documents or direct explanation from superiors, but asked me to say to my subordinates: "Your former chief is out of class, and I will be your chief from now on." ”
Jiang Weiqing is a person with high emotional intelligence, of course, he will not do this, he went directly to Chen Yi, met Tan Zhenlin on the road, Tan Zhenlin asked him not to go, saying that Chen Yi was angry, but he did not listen.
When Jiang Weiqing arrived at Chen Yi's command post, Chen Yi was angry that the battle for Fengshan in the Battle of Subei was not going well, and he said to Wei Guoqing on the phone that Wang Bicheng had been removed from his post, and if he could not take Fengshan again, Wei Guoqing would be Wang Bicheng's second.
Jiang Weiqing was also a man with eyesight, and he especially waited until the end of the Subei Campaign to see Chen Yi and Su Yu again, and said that there were three reasons for Lianshui's defeat: first, a mistake in judging the enemy's main direction of attack, second, improper deployment of troops, and third, being attacked by the enemy.
Chen Yi asked Jiang Weiqing why he didn't reflect upwards? Jiang Weiqing said:
We have made suggestions three times in succession to strengthen the defense of the western front and prevent the enemy from sneaking attacks, if you don't believe it, you can ask Master Tan. By the time we were ordered to come back, it was too late.
The reason jiang Weiqing said was that Chen Yi and Su Yu didn't know it before. Chen Yi was silent for a while and said to Jiang Weiqing:
"There is something wrong with you, and I took back my life."
Although there have been such results, but all along, in people's impressions, the main responsibility for the loss of Lianshui is still Wang Bicheng, after all, the 6th Division is mainly managed by Wang Bicheng and Jiang Weiqing, and compared with the records of other main columns, the loss of Lianshui is really too big a setback.
As one of the first 14 military experts identified by the Central Military Commission, Su Yu has his own set of unique views on the evaluation of the combat effectiveness of the troops, that is, he does not look at how many prisoners have been captured or how many weapons have been captured
"Look at the role it played in the victory of the battle".
Judging from Su Yu's judgment, the loss of Lianshui by the 6th Column turned the central Soviet region behind enemy lines and caused the Huaye troops to suffer a major strategic setback, which was a major factor in the exclusion of the 6th Column from the main force of the first class.
5. Comments on events
In fact, the 6th Column was excluded from the 6 first-class main forces by Su Yu, in addition to the defeat of the Second Lianshui Campaign, but also because the performance of this column in the Battle of Laiwu and the Battle of Huaihai was not satisfactory, but the Lianshui Campaign was particularly prominent.
However, for Wang Bicheng, it is indeed a bit unjust to completely blame the defeat in the Battle of Lianshui on his head, after all, this is a battle that he cannot completely decide, but it is not accurate to say that he himself does not have any responsibility, and the subjective initiative of the front-line generals in the war is also quite important, and the subjective initiative is precisely an important criterion for measuring the generals.
Wang Bicheng's battle-ready performance is a common feature from the generals of the Red Fourth Front. The Red Fourth Front was much inferior in tactics and subjective initiative to the Red Front, and its roots came from Zhang Guotao.
In order to control the Red Fourth Front, Zhang Guotao vigorously promoted workers and peasant soldiers with low education, vigorously suppressed and purged cadres and fighters with a little culture, and even classified all those who wore glasses as the targets of the repression.
When the Red Fourth Front and the Red Front met in Sichuan, the difference between the two armies was very obvious. The cadres and soldiers of the Red Fourth Front are brave, but the tactics are weak, there are many soldiers, and there are few cadres left, while the Red Front Army has a high tactical quality and a large number of cadres remain.
In a typical case, when the Red 9th Army was guarding Gulang in the Hexi Corridor, under the command of The Military Commander Sun Yuqing, there were almost no tactics, and it relied on bravery and hard fighting with the Ma Family Army, resulting in heavy losses.
Of course, after the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, many generals from the Red Fourth Front also had high tactical qualities, and they grew rapidly in battle. Wang Bicheng is also a general who can fight, but when he met Zhang Lingfu at the peak in the early days of the Liberation War, it cannot be said that there is also a reason for luck.