The Huaihai Campaign was huge in scale, with the two major field armies fighting in concert, with a total of 23 columns and 56 divisions (brigades) of 600,000 troops, and the Kuomintang troops participating in the battle of 34 armies and 82 divisions with 800,000 people. The campaign was vast, 350 km from east to west and 250 km from north to south, and lasted for 66 days from 6 November 1948 to 10 January 1949.
During the entire Huaihai Campaign, the people of the five provinces of Suzhou, Lu, Henan, Anhui, and Hebei went all out to support the front, and the people of Shandong, under the call of "everything for the victory of the front line," went through hardships and supported the people's children and soldiers in terms of human, material, and financial resources. The East China Bureau conscientiously implemented the instructions of the Central Military Commission and the General Front Committee on logistics support, issued the instruction of "going all out to support the front line," and put forward the slogan of "wherever the PLA fights, it will support there."
Before the battle began, in early October 1948, the East China Bureau set up a leading organization for the support of the front, and on October 13, it formulated the "Pre-branch Work Plan for the Second Battle of Huaye autumn", which assigned clear tasks to the local party committees and county party committees in Shandong, and made a meticulous division of labor and put forward specific measures for the collection, processing, transportation, and distribution of grain. On November 4, the East China Bureau established the East China Branch Committee, which was located in Linyi City, south of Luzhong.
Under the specific organization and leadership of the East China Branch Committee, the people of the Shandong Liberated Areas launched large-scale activities to support the front line of the Huaihai Campaign. They have gone all out to ensure that there is food and manpower, and especially in ensuring the supply of grain and grass in the front-line war. Throughout the campaign, the 600,000 PLA troops participated in the battle, plus the former migrant workers, and the number of people eating grain on the front line totaled about 1.5 million, and 3.5 million to 5 million catties of grain and horse feed were needed every day. The Huaihai area is a famine area of long-term plunder by the enemy and floods for many years, the masses have an extremely hard life, the grain burden is weak, and the troops and migrant workers mainly rely on the transportation and supply of grain in the liberated areas. However, the front line needs a huge amount of grain, coupled with the severe cold weather, the long supply line, and the inconvenience of transportation, so whether or not we can ensure the food supply of the front-line troops has a bearing on the overall situation of the entire campaign and directly affects the outcome of the campaign.
To this end, Mao Zedong repeatedly stressed that "it is necessary to make overall plans to solve the three-to-five-month rations of the whole army and 1.3 million civilian workers." In order to accomplish the important task of supplying grain for the Huaihai Campaign, the East China Branch Committee immediately took action, first requisitioning 100 million kilograms of grain as front-line grain from the fourth (Nishan), fifth (Taizao), and sixth (coastal) areas of Luzhongnan, which were close to the theater of operations, and then transferring it from the rear of the Bohai Sea and Jiaodong. Throughout the Huaihai Campaign, the Shandong Liberated Areas shipped an average of 1.5 million kilograms of grain per day.
The people of the Bohai Region have worked day and night to complete the processing task of more than 100 million kilograms of grain, and the masses in 28 counties in the whole region are fighting day and night next to the mill. In the sixth district of LuzhongNan (Binhai District), 100,000 women processed three batches of military grain of more than 20 million catties in one month, and achieved no bran and no shell in the rice, and no bran and no sand in the noodles. The newly liberated city of Jinan completed the processing task of 50 million kilograms of grain in order to support the front line.
While collecting and transferring grain, the Former Committee of the East China Branch also collected sideline food to ensure the supply of combat troops. On December 16, 1948, the Central Military Commission and Chairman Mao Zedong issued an order to comfort the frontline soldiers with one kilogram of pork each during the New Year's Day and Spring Festival to encourage the combat mood of the commanders and fighters. To this end, the East China Branch Committee urgently requisitioned more than 860,000 kilograms of pork from the central and southern regions of Luzhong in two batches to ensure the supply of meat for the troops during the festival. Thanks to the vigorous support of the people of Shandong and the people of the liberated areas, a large amount of grain and sideline food supplies were sent to the front, thus forming a sharp contrast between our army and the Kuomintang army, which used coffins as firewood and roasted war horses to fill the hunger, and effectively shook and disintegrated the hearts of the enemy's army.
In the 20 days around New Year's Day in 1949, more than 14,000 enemy troops surrendered, equivalent to the strength of two enemy divisions.
At the same time, the Shandong Liberated Area also undertook the huge supply of military firewood, various equipment, quilts, weapons and ammunition, as well as a large number of casualty transfer work, road and bridge construction and combat work, ensuring all kinds of needs for the Huaihai Campaign. According to statistics, during the entire Huaihai Campaign, in order to ensure the supply of the front line, the transfer of combat materials and the transport of the wounded, Shandong dispatched 2183398 migrant workers, accounting for nearly half of the total number of former migrant workers. Of the total number of civilian workers with the army, 92% are from Shandong. A total of 333057 large and small vehicles were dispatched, 192357 pairs, livestock 179509 heads, 3,250 ships, 219 cars, 51,165 wounded were transported, 525 million kilograms of grain were transferred (including 64 million kilograms of millet in the former Hebei Luyu District, which now belongs to Heze, Jining, and Liaocheng areas in Shandong), 410 million kilograms of firewood and grass, 726,550 kilograms of cooking oil, 839208 kilograms of salt, and the monument to the victory in the Huaihai Campaign will forever be inscribed with the great achievements of the Shandong people.