During the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, who was the highest-ranking Chinese military general captured by the Japanese army? Many history buffs do not know much about this man named Pang Bingxun, who was then the commander-in-chief of the Twenty-fourth Army group of the National Revolutionary Army.
A brief introduction to General Pang Bingxun. Born in 1879 in Xinhe County, Hebei Province, he joined the Qing army at a young age, and resigned after the founding of the Republic of China to return to his hometown to work as a farmer.
In 1920, Pang Bingxun's hometown was flooded, and his life was extremely difficult. In order to support his family, at the introduction of an old friend, Pang Bingxun, who was 41 years old, re-enlisted in the army and became an aide-de-camp in Feng Yuxiang's Sun Yue Brigade of the Northwest Army. In the subsequent military career, Pang Bingxun oscillated back and forth between the Beiyang warlords and the Northwest Army, and his position also rose, successively serving as regimental commander, brigade commander, division commander, and military commander, and was given the nickname: "Tumbler".
After the outbreak of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression in 1937, Pang Bingxun first accompanied the 29th Army Song Zheyuan to resist the Japanese in Hebei. Later, due to the heavy casualties of his unit, he was transferred to the Fifth Theater to repair and prepare for battle. Pang Bingxun was 58 years old at the time, not only older than other military commanders, but also several years older than li Zongren, commander of the theater. During the Republic of China period, the soldiers were very particular about generations, and the junior generals were embarrassed to command Brother Pang, so Li Zongren had to promote him to the commander of the army and let him become an army alone. In fact, Pang Bingxun's Third Army had only one division of 15,000 men, and even the first-class army could not compare.
In the Battle of Taierzhuang, the Third Army of the Miscellaneous Weak Brigade faced the First Main Force of the Japanese Army, the Itagaki Division (i.e., the Fifth Division of the Japanese Army), and repeatedly repelled the Japanese attack at the cost of more than 10,000 casualties, making a great contribution to the victory of the battle. Pang Bingxun himself was awarded a Medal of the Blue Sky and White Sun for this merit.
In September 1939, Pang Bingxun was promoted to commander-in-chief of the 24th Group Army of the National Revolutionary Army. It has three corps under the jurisdiction of the 27th Army, the 40th Army and the New 5th Army (Sun Dianying), with average combat effectiveness.
Pang Bingxun was captured by the Japanese army in May 1943. Earlier, the 24th Army suffered heavy losses because the Japanese army swept the Taihang Mountains and retreated to the deep mountains to fight guerrillas. Pang Bingxun followed the transfer of the Fifth Division of the 40th Army, and encountered the Japanese sweeping forces at the Nine Kilns of Lingchuan, in which Pang Bingxun was separated from his own large army, leaving only his son Pang Qingzhen and two guards who were staff officers of the group army. The four of them hid in the woods for a night, and after dawn, they looked for a large force in the direction of LinXian County, only to reach the three suburbs of HuiXian and encountered the Japanese army, and the local compatriots sacrificed their lives to save each other and led the four people to the Batu Cave of Phoenix Mountain to hide. After Pang Bingxun and the others hid for a while, they felt that this was not the way to go, so they had to risk letting the guards go out to explore the direction of the wind, so as to return to the team as soon as possible.
Pang Bingxun's guards went to the local market to inquire about the news, but they did not want to meet the soldiers of the New Fifth Army, Who had just surrendered to the Japanese army and became traitors. The guard, unaware that Sun Dianying had surrendered to the enemy, hoped that Sun Dianying would save their commander-in-chief, and told Sun Dianying where Pang Bingxun was hiding. When Sun Dianying learned the news that Pang Bingxun was trapped in Phoenix Mountain, he was overjoyed and immediately reported to his Japanese master. In this way, Pang Bingxun, commander-in-chief of the 24th Group Army of the Tangtang National Revolutionary Army, became a prisoner of the Japanese army (after Pang Bingxun was captured, Wang Yaowu succeeded him as commander-in-chief of the 24th Group Army).
After Pang Bingxun was captured, he committed suicide by hunger strike many times and was rescued by the Japanese army. There were Kuomintang intelligence officers in the puppet army who reported pang Bingxun's capture to Chiang Kai-shek, and Chiang Kai-shek instructed that it would be useless to die in vain and that it would be possible to surrender to save the country. So Pang Bingxun borrowed a donkey and became the commander of the 24th Group Army of the puppet Nanjing government. Pang Bingxun raised a force of more than 10,000 people in the enemy-occupied area, and the Kuomintang authorities instructed him to be ready to correct it at any time and drew up a detailed plan for his rectification. Unfortunately, Pang Bingxun acted imprudently, and was sniffed by the Japanese, and temporarily canceled the military exercise with PangBu's participation, which made the matter a disaster anyway.
After Pang Bingxun became a traitor, he did not do anything harmful to nature and reason. Anyway, the Japanese, the Wang puppet government and the National Government did not dare to commit crimes, and he smiled at anyone who came to him, and the smoothness of the veteran youzi was vividly displayed.
After Japan announced its unconditional surrender on August 15, 1945, Pang Bingxun immediately sent a telegram to Chiang Kai-shek, indicating that he had made meritorious contributions to his crimes and was waiting to be dealt with. Chiang Kai-shek was trying to take advantage of Pang Bingxun and the Eighth Route Army to seize the fruits of the victory of the War of Resistance, and not only did not pursue the responsibility for defeat and surrender to the enemy, but also appointed Pang Bingxun as the commander of the advance army to prevent the Japanese army from surrendering to the Eighth Route Army.
In October 1945, Pang Bingxun's 40th Army first launched an attack on the Eighth Route Army in North China, and the Battle of Handan broke out. Under the command of Liu Bocheng and Deng Xiaoping, the troops of the Jinji-Hebei Luyu Military Region dealt a fatal blow to the Kuomintang 40th Army, and even the commander of the army, Ma Fawu, was taken prisoner. Pang Bingxun was hit by this blow, collapsed, surrendered his military power, and hung up a false pension of a senior senator of the Ministry of National Defense.
In December 1949, Pang Bingxun ran to Taiwan with his family and Chiang Kai-shek. Due to the large number of people in the family, the salary paid by the Taiwan authorities cannot support the family. Pang Bingxun and Sun Lianzhong, an old comrade-in-arms of the Northwest Army, jointly opened a small restaurant and barely made ends meet.
Pang Died in Taipei on January 12, 1963, at the age of 85.