On the afternoon of April 23, 1949, Song Shilun, commander of the Ninth Corps of the People's Liberation Army, and Guo Huaruo, political commissar, sent an urgent telegram to Cheng Jun, commander of the Twenty-fifth Army: Immediately lead the troops to advance rapidly to Xuancheng, Anhui Province, and pursue and annihilate the Kuomintang Twentieth Army, which had fled south from Nanjing.
After receiving the order, Cheng Jun was very excited -- the soldiers of the whole army were eager to fight, and finally they could fight a good battle!
However, Cheng Jun also understood that this battle should be fought well with learning, because if the pursuit was improper, the main force of the enemy was scattered, and it could not be fought into a war of annihilation but a battle of defeat, then there would be no way to make a difference to the superiors.
It was precisely because of this that Cheng Jun did not rush to order the troops to leave immediately, he had to make a good plan for the pursuit route, and he must not blindly move.
However, the problem is still not small, after all, the only information we have now is that the enemy's Twentieth Army has fled southward, and there is no information as to whether the enemy's main force has dispersed, which route it will run, and where it has fled now.
That is to say, what Cheng Jun wanted to fight was a pursuit battle in which the enemy's movements were unknown.
However, the enemy was in a hurry like a lost dog, desperately fleeing south, there was not much time left for Cheng Jun to carefully consider the pursuit route, he must make a quick decision, otherwise he missed the fighter, and the consequences were unimaginable!
What to do? Cheng Jun unfolded the battle map, his eyes fixed on the direction of the enemy's escape, and his brain spun rapidly...
After pondering for a moment, his gaze landed on a small dot on the map, and suddenly a strange light appeared in his eyes, and then he drew a circle on the map with the index finger of his right hand, and said in a tone that seemed to be determined and seemed to be cheering himself up: "Here! Chase here! ”
The combat staff officers on the side did not understand why the commander had a sudden inspiration, and they all gathered around, and when they saw clearly that the place where Cheng Jun's finger was was the three words "Wanlan Town", they all asked in confusion: "Commander, what happened to this Wanlan Town?" ”
"It is very likely that the main force of the enemy will pass through here!" Cheng Jun tapped the name of the place "Wan Lan Town" with his fingers hard, "We must take this as a hypothetical target, let the troops pursue in parallel, and achieve the purpose of encircling and fleeing the enemy with high-intensity marching!" ”
As for why he deduced that the enemy's main force was going to pass through the town of Wanlan, Cheng Jun did not explain in detail, because the task was too urgent and the time was too hasty to allow repeated entanglements on this issue.
Resolve now, act now! Cheng Jun immediately issued a pursuit order——
The Seventy-fourth Division was ordered to march rapidly along the banks of the Qingyi River as a right column, and must camp south of the town of Wanlan before dawn the next day, a 120-mile route of pursuit.
The Seventy-fifth Division was ordered to march rapidly along the road from Wuhu to Xuancheng, cross the Qingyi River north of The Town of Wanlan, and make an angle with the Seventy-fourth Division that had entered the south of the town of Wanlan, and the two divisions formed a posture of attacking the town of Wanlan from north to south.
Cheng Jun personally led the Seventy-third Division, followed by the Seventy-fifth Division, with a total of 130 miles of pursuit.
It can be said that
Cheng Jun was forced to plan such a pursuit plan in a way that the enemy's intelligence was unknown: Assuming that the main force of the enemy's Twentieth Army might gather in the town of Wanlan, let the two pursuit armies he sent take this as the goal, bite the tiger's mouth of the iron pincer there, and completely annihilate the enemy!
It was a seemingly bold but deliberate deployment, for it was the most targeted pursuit he had selected based on the genius intuition of a commander and the repeated calculation of the enemy's escape route.
After receiving the order, the commanders of the divisions did not know why the commander planned such a pursuit route, but the military situation was urgent, and there was no time to ask more questions, so they could only command the troops to act immediately.
Of course, the cadres and fighters below the commanders of the divisions and divisions did not understand the intentions of the commanders, after all, the soldiers regarded obeying orders as their duty, and all they could do was to rush to the road according to the instructions of their superiors.
Incredibly, however, almost as Cheng Jun had predicted, the main force of the enemy's Twenty Army did indeed reach the town of WanLan before dawn the next day and was stationed there!
The Seventy-fourth Division of the Right Column, under the leadership of division commander Zhang Huaizhong, took the lead in reaching five miles south of the town of Wanlan in accordance with Cheng Jun's instructions. The troops took two prisoners there, and after interrogation, they learned that there were troops stationed in the town of Wanlan, and indeed it was the enemy's Twentieth Army!
Zhang Huaizhong was overjoyed, and immediately ordered his troops to unfold on the ridges of heron silk nests, cross roads, soap horn trees, and eighteen quintals outside the town, and pay close attention to the construction of fortifications.
At the same time, he immediately sent an urgent telegram to the military command post to report the enemy's movements.
Cheng Jun was even more overjoyed, and immediately ordered Xie Rui, commander of the Seventy-fifth Division, to attack the enemy.
Although the Seventy-fourth Division took the lead in engaging the enemy who was trying to escape, at the crucial moment, the Seventy-fifth Division and the Seventy-third Division rushed to the scene one after another, throwing tens of thousands of horses and horses of the enemy's 20th Army into a huge whirlpool, unfolding a breathtaking picture of a large-scale hunting!
In this interception and annihilation battle, the Twenty-fifth Army used only 1 army to completely annihilate 1 army of the enemy's 20th Army, plus 2 regiments and 1 security brigade of the enemy's 99th Army, killing, wounding, and capturing more than 25,000 enemy people!
After the war, the Corps Headquarters sent a commendation order congratulating the Twenty-fifth Army on creating an example of annihilating an army and an army for the first time!
When the enemy's movements are unknown, he locks on to the target of pursuit in a flashy way, and this legendary victory has also become a classic and divine stroke in the career of Cheng Jun, the founding lieutenant general.