In the early 1960s, Montgomery, a famous British military general and famous British military figure who was famous for commanding the Battle of Alliman, the Sicily landings and the Normandy landings, saw the imposing lineup of the Chinese People's Liberation Army during his visit to New China, and could not help but express this feeling:
Don't fight the Chinese army on the ground! Otherwise, there is no doubt that you will lose.
Marshal Montgomery, then 74, came to this conclusion not as a polite remark, but as a heartfelt emotion.
Marshal Montgomery, who grew up in the Second World War, was full of supreme glory and aura, and was a military man who could stand alone. Because after witnessing the momentum and boldness of the People's Liberation Army in the "1949 Sino-British Yangtze River Artillery Battle" and the "Korean War", I have to admit that the PLA was the king of land warfare that stood out in World War II.
To this end, during the Vietnam War, Hudkins, William Westmoreland, and Creighton Abrams, who had served as commander-in-chief of the U.S. military in Vietnam, did not dare to let the U.S. military cross the 17th parallel because of fear that the Chinese army would officially send troops.
However, Vietnam's Le Duong did not believe Montgomery's conclusions and had to take the initiative to provoke a war between China and Vietnam.
Young people are fearless
In the colonial era, the "iron-blooded chancellor" of the German Empire, Otto von Bismarck, had this to say:
Cannons are used to measure the size of the land, and truth is always within the range of cannons.
It is precisely because of this sentence that two inhumane world wars have been triggered.
After the end of World War II, Bismarck's military ideas still had many followers, even in superpowers such as the Soviet Union and the United States, there were many figures who followed bismarck's military ideas and views.
So that after the United States and the Soviet Union joined hands to pull the two former global hegemons of Britain and France off the altar, the two countries replaced them, and the Korean War and the Vietnam War broke out in the context of the struggle for hegemony between the United States and the Soviet Union.
Founded by Ho Chi Minh, Wu Yuanjia and others in Vietnam, with the help of China and the Soviet Union, the North Vietnamese army, which had no industrial base, finally drove out the multinational force led by the US military and realized the reunification of the north and south in 1975.
However, Ho Chi Minh, vietnam's founding leader who had truly experienced the storms and waves, died in 1969 and did not witness the great victory of North Vietnam. Lai Sung, who lacked practical experience, took over, which laid the groundwork for the subsequent Sino-Vietnamese border conflict.
Born in 1907, although he began working in 1928, he was arrested by the French colonial authorities in 1931, imprisoned for 5 years, released in 1936, arrested and imprisoned again in 1940, and released in 1945 after the surrender of the Invading Japanese Army.
In his 38 years of life, he was isolated from the world twice, separated from society for 10 years, missed the vigorous anti-fascist war, and shortly after his release, he was directly selected as a key member of the Ho Chi Minh government. At this time, Li Sun can only be regarded as a calf that has just been born, and life still needs more experience.
Immediately after, the French colonists made a comeback and the Vietnamese War broke out. The Vietnamese-French War was a war between north Vietnamese soldiers and civilians and French colonial troops established by Ho Chi Minh, Wu Yuanjia and others, and the city of Ho Chi Minh (formerly known as Saigon) at that time was not under the control of North Vietnam.
In this context, china and Vietnam are connected by mountains and rivers, and have a relationship of cold lips and teeth, in this context, Chinese people tighten their belts to help the North Vietnamese army fight against the French colonial army, and China's founding generals Chen Geng and Admiral Wei Guoqing even came to the front line to direct the battle.
However, in Lê Tần's view, the first merit of defeating the French colonists was their Vietnamese army, because most of the soldiers who shed blood and died were Vietnamese, and the Chinese people only did some mental work within their capabilities; the North Vietnamese victory over the French colonists still fulfilled the old saying: cannons are used to measure the size of the country, and the truth is always within the range of cannons.
However, North Vietnam's victories in the Vietnamese-French War were limited, and its territory recognized by the international community was only the area north of 17 degrees north latitude, and south of the 17 degree north latitude, which was still under the control of the French colonists.
In 1955, the United States replaced French colonial rule in southern Vietnam and supported Diệm Dinh Yan to establish the South Vietnamese regime.
Since then, the north Vietnamese and Vietnamese armies have frequently fought, and as the North Vietnamese army gradually gained the upper hand, the US troops stationed in South Vietnam directly intervened, which is known as the "Vietnam War".
Despite the U.S. military's meddling in the Vietnam War, the U.S. military has been taught a harsh lesson by the volunteers. In order to avoid irritating China, the U.S. military did not cross the 17th parallel, but actually fought in the territory controlled by South Vietnam.
In combat under this premise, the US military cannot play freely, but tactically, it has not suffered a big loss, but it has not been able to achieve its strategic goals. Due to the energy crisis and economic inadequacy, the US military lost Saigon, and the South Vietnamese army had to rely on itself.
As soon as the Americans left, the South Vietnamese million-strong army soon disintegrated. South Vietnam's million-strong army, at best, a group of mass actors, have not had a decent record, usually heard the sound of guns, many soldiers are weak legs, naturally can not beat the North Vietnamese army that has been trained in the fire of war for nearly 30 years.
It is precisely because he has picked up such a big bargain twice that The North Vietnamese head of state Lê Sun is even more convinced:
Cannons are used to measure the size of the land, and truth is always within the range of cannons
。 Nothing else, because the North Vietnamese army fired guns, making the Geneva Franco-Vietnamese Armistice Agreement worthless and making the United States a superpower.
The situation in the Vietnam War was clear long before the withdrawal of American troops from South Vietnam. As the head of the North Vietnamese state, Lê Duần also began to build the "dream of a great power" early on.
Because Vietnam is connected to the mountains and rivers of China, and in 1971, the legitimate seat of New China in the United Nations was restored. If Vietnam wanted to replace the French colonists and dominate the Indochina Peninsula, it would have to consult China no matter what.
Therefore, in 1974, when the great men of China, such as Mao Zedong, Zhu De, and Zhou Enlai, were still alive, Li Sun began to instruct his confidants to test the new China.
Hwang Song, then spokesman for the North Vietnamese authorities and editor-in-chief of the North Vietnamese newspaper People's Daily, openly rejected in 1974 the demarcation of the territorial waters between China and Vietnam, which had been explicitly endorsed by Ho Chi Minh, the founding leader of North Vietnam.
In early 1975, during an interview with a Swedish reporter, north Vietnamese probing behavior escalated, and Wong Song once again represented the Le Son clique and released North Vietnamese post-war anti-China and pro-Soviet remarks.
At the end of April 1975, North Vietnam defeated a million South Vietnamese troops and received a large number of weapons and equipment left by the South Vietnamese army and the US army, including aircraft, warships, tanks, rockets, cannons, military vehicles, mines, missiles and other heavy weapons and equipment; coupled with the continuous military assistance of China and the Soviet Union during the war, Vietnam was the only country in the world at that time that had a large number of sophisticated weapons and equipment of the three powers of China, the United States and the Soviet Union.
With a million troops, and all the officers and men of the army have risen from the smoke of war, and at the same time have the sophisticated weapons and equipment of the three major powers of China, the United States and the Soviet Union, at this time, Li Sun is already blind, and he has to carry out armed provocations against China. At that time, the Vietnamese authorities also had figures such as Wu Yuanjia and Huang Wenhuan, who also had a certain prestige, but they only held different opinions, and they were all kicked out.
Not listening to the old man's words suffers losses in front of you
In 1977, the Le Son clique began directing the Vietnamese Public Security Army into China's border areas to carry out various provocations. In the beginning, it was only to enter Chinese territory to carry out operations such as laying mines and laying barbed wire. Later, it gradually evolved into beating Chinese soldiers and civilians with blunt objects and shooting Chinese soldiers and civilians.
It is clear that the Vietnamese authorities, headed by Le Duện, are taking the initiative to provoke a war between China and Vietnam. Because Li Sun has always believed that cannons are used to measure the size of the country, the truth is always within the range of cannons. Whatever the reason for joining the war, it is the winner who is the king and the loser. The defeated side either cut the land and seeks peace or compensation.
At that time, China's development focus was on the field of economic construction, and the Platon Army, which had once shook the world, rarely appeared on the international stage, making Lê Sun once believe that as long as China and Vietnam went to war, the PLA must not be an opponent of the Vietnamese army.
In order to ensure that nothing was lost, Vietnam invaded the TingMu Shan area of Jingxi County, Guangxi Province, China from November 1 to 3, 1978, creating the appalling "Ting Mu Shan Bloodshed Incident", and pouring dirty water on China, and at the same time leasing the territory of the Cam Ranh Bay Base with an area of up to 100 square kilometers to the Soviet fleet, in exchange for the "Soviet-Vietnamese Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation" with a military nature.
After determining that China had no way to retreat and had to send troops to attack Vietnam, the Vietnamese army officially invaded Cambodia and Laos on December 3, 1978. At that time, Vietnam, with a population of 53 million, Li Sun dared to fight on the third front, which showed how confident he was at that time.
At that time in China, many founding generals with outstanding military achievements were not old, and the People's Liberation Army had been reborn at the strategic and tactical levels and was moving towards the goal of modernization. Therefore, when the PEOPLE's Liberation Army carried out self-defense counterattack operations against Vietnam, the results were not suspenseful.
In the self-defense counterattack against Vietnam, the Chinese army captured 22 advanced Soviet-made anti-aircraft missiles and more than 800 advanced Soviet-made anti-tank missiles from the Vietnamese army, annihilated more than 50,000 Vietnamese troops, and destroyed a large number of economic and military facilities in northern Vietnam.
In the course of the engagement, the Chinese People's Liberation Army relied on its superb artillery fire technology to smash the Vietnamese army's conspiracy to rely on subtropical mountain jungle tunnel tactics to fight a protracted war, so that the bluff Soviet army did not dare to intervene openly. Countries such as Afghanistan and Egypt began to shake off Soviet control.
However, after the Return of the Chinese Army,Lê Duồn died and suffered a life of guilt, not acknowledging the defeat of the Vietnamese army, but believing that they had won the war. In order to strive for greater "victory", the "military priority" plan was tightened.
Since the beginning of April 1979, the Le Thanh Group began to expand the army, so that the total strength of the Vietnamese regular army increased from the original 1 million to 1.2 million, at the same time, the proportion of artillery units in the infantry division was increased, the army division was equipped with a certain number of tanks and vehicles, and the whole army adopted the mobile combat training mode of large corps in an attempt to compete with the Chinese army. As a result, the Chinese People's Liberation Army vigorously launched the "defend the frontier and return fire against vietnamese artillery" operation.
In March 1983, Lê Duạng, believing that the Vietnamese army already had the mobile combat capabilities of large corps, was the first to train in Thailand.
At that time, the Vietnamese army dispatched more than 800 people from the 101st Marine Brigade, known as the special elite unit of the Vietnamese Army, using 15 T-55 tanks, as well as river battleship speedboats, some large-caliber cannons, mortars and other heavy weapons and equipment, to build fortifications and kill civilians several kilometers inside Thailand.
The Thai army was forced to counterattack, killing 280 Vietnamese troops, capturing 47 prisoners, capturing a large number of weapons and equipment, and completely expelling the Vietnamese army at the cost of 78 casualties.
Elite troops could not defeat the Thai army, and the Lê Thanh group naturally believed that the combat effectiveness of the Vietnamese army could not yet fight the Chinese army on the ground, so they then implemented the plan to strengthen the army. When the troops lacked funds, they waved a big hand and approved the army to do business in order to satisfy self-sufficiency. It has also continuously sent troops to the Sino-Vietnamese border to continue to carry out armed provocations in order to enhance the combat effectiveness of the troops.
Then, in early April 1984, the Chinese army recaptured the Lao Shan and Eryin Shan areas, and the Vietnamese army began to formulate a rotational war plan for the Northern Vietnam Theater (similar to the Chinese border rotation plan).
In the midst of the exhaustion of military force, Vietnam neither paid close attention to industrial construction nor agricultural production, and even if it was tightening its belt, it was necessary to build a modern army. By 1986, Vietnam was receiving less and less foreign aid, and the huge army was consuming more and more materials every day, and the whole country was full of complaints.
At this time, Li Sun was already on the verge of being killed, unable to clean up his own mess, and could only count one day a day. Finally, he died of illness in July. Its successor, the Long March (formerly known as Deng Chun District, renamed in admiration of China's 25,000-mile Long March) saw China as an example to emulate China, engaged in a reform and opening up, and although it began to disarm, it officially approved the military to achieve self-sufficiency through business activities.
Today, the Vietnamese army controls the lifeblood of Vietnam's economy, and the social divide between rich and poor has made Vietnam lose the opportunity to keep pace with the times. As a result, Vietnam is helpless in the face of the new crown pneumonia epidemic...
Li Sun overestimated himself, thinking that he was leaning on his thighs and had to fight with the Chinese army on the ground, and he was happy. But the Vietnamese army, which had been equipped with the world's advanced weapons and equipment at that time, was crippled; Vietnam, once known as the "world's third military power", lost at least two decades of national fortunes. This is the consequence of not listening to the old man!
Resources:
[1] Wang Fei: Bismarck, Iron-Blooded Prime Minister[J] Law and Society, 2010(21):1
[2] Tian Yongqing: "Never fight with the Chinese army on the ground": [J] Secretarial Work from Montgomery's Visit to China, 2013(10): 55-55
[3] (Yue) Huang Wenhuan: Vietnamese-Chinese Friendship and the Betrayal of Lê Sun [M] People's Publishing House, 1982