In 1954, the Shanghai Film Studio filmed the movie "Reconnaissance of Crossing the River", which quickly became a sensational and household name classic film after its release at the end of the year. What is less well known is that the strange soldier in the film, the cross-river advance brigade, is related to the revelation that a founding lieutenant general got from a plate of leeks during dinner.
It was at the end of March 1949, when a million troops of the People's Liberation Army approached the Yangtze River, preparing to cross the river and directly attack Nanjing.
On the afternoon of this day, the commander of the Ninth Corps, Song Shilun (a native of Liling, Hunan, a founding general), and Guo Huaruo, the political commissar (a native of Fuzhou, Fujian Province, a founding lieutenant general), came to Wuwei Linjiangba, Anhui Province, and went to the command post of the Twenty-seventh Army to check the preparations of the department for crossing the river.
When dinner time came, Nie Fengzhi invited the two superiors to dinner together. Hong Jianjun, the head of the cooking team, brought three dishes and a soup, and although one dish was just a mediocre leek scrambled egg, it looked particularly tempting, especially the turquoise leeks, which made many people who had not eaten a fresh vegetable for a long time feel amazing.
Nie Fengzhi, commander of the Twenty-seventh Army (a native of Huang'an, Hubei Province, a founding lieutenant general), asked Hong Jianjun puzzledly, "These vegetables are all only available in Jiangnan, where did you get them?" It's not a small thing! ”
The commander of the Wang regiment next to him interjected: "We are only separated from Jiangnan by a river, and a few days ago we had a group of scouts who transitioned to reconnoiter the enemy's situation, but what is infuriating is that we did not encounter a single enemy, nor did we detect any enemy situation, but only got this little vegetable..."
When Nie Fengzhi heard this, he was furious: "Play the piano randomly!" How can reconnaissance across the river take the vegetables planted by the masses? This is a serious violation of the discipline of the masses! ”
Commander Wang replied with a red face: "This is all to blame for my lack of education, and in the future I will definitely strengthen discipline education and never commit crimes again!" ”
Song Shi patted him on the shoulder and said, "I see it like this, when the time comes to cross the river, you let the scout find the owner of the vegetable and compensate according to the price." Today, even If Commander Nie Junjun is a guest of honor! ”
"If you know your mistakes, you can correct them," Guo Huaruo wanted to ease the atmosphere: "Let's eat first!" ”
During the meal, Guo Huaruo looked at the leeks on the plate and thought about it, and after a while, he said to the crowd: "Judging from what Commander Wang said, I have received an important enlightenment, which is of great benefit to our river crossing troops." ”
"What revelation?" Song Shilun and Nie Fengzhi asked in unison.
"It can be seen that the enemy in Jiangnan is not a monolith, and as long as our troops make preparations in two aspects, they can completely cross the Yangtze River."
The crowd listened and their eyes lit up: "Which two aspects?" ”
Guo Huaruo smiled and said: "First, send people to reconnoiter the terrain in advance and choose a suitable landing site; the other is to collect as many ferry tools as possible." ”
"I should look at it like this—" Nie Fengzhi patted his thigh, "I immediately sent a battalion to Jiangnan to reconnoiter again, to find out the enemy situation, water conditions, people's feelings, and terrain along the river, and to choose the ideal breakthrough point." ”
"Old Nie is right, it should be done." Song Shilun agreed.
"I would like to add," Guo Huaruo said, "and send another reconnaissance detachment to bring it to the radio, get in touch with the underground organization in Jiangnan, and report the situation of the enemy in person in a timely and uninterrupted manner." When the campaign is launched, let them cross the river with the coordination of the local armed forces in Jiangnan, so that our chances of victory will be greatly improved. ”
"Right, right, the political commissar is really thoughtful." Nie Fengzhi nodded continuously.
"Old Nie your men fried a plate of leeks, but let Lao Guo see the doorway!" Song Shilun said to him happily, "From this point of view, this meal that Old Nie entertained was very rich! ”
Subsequently, the crowd reported the proposal of crossing the river for reconnaissance to the General Front Committee, and quickly got a reply: agree, immediately implemented!
Subsequently, Nie Fengzhi repeatedly studied with political commissar Liu Haotian (a native of Ningdu, Jiangxi, a founding lieutenant general), he Minxue (a new person in Yongxin, Jiangxi), and Liu Yan, chief of the Operations Department (a native of Penglai, Shandong, a founding colonel), and others, and came up with a more detailed plan of action.
It was finally determined that 300 men from three divisions of the Twenty-seventh Army and two reconnaissance companies directly under the Twenty-seventh Army would be drawn to form a river crossing advance brigade to carry out the reconnaissance task of crossing the river. Zhang Chen, chief of staff of the 242nd Regiment (a native of Shexian County, Anhui Province, and lieutenant colonel of the Founding Kingdom), and Mu Sirong, chief of the military reconnaissance section (an adult in Shandong), served as the chief and deputy commanders respectively.
At 10:00 p.m. on April 6, Nie Fengzhi personally came to the riverside to send off the advance team for the river crossing in the dark of night.
Zhang Chen and Murong Sirong led all the personnel to board the wooden boat and sailed to the opposite shore, and it took less than an hour to smoothly board the opposite shore, breaking the fixed view that "wooden boats cannot cross the river" in one fell swoop through practice, and greatly boosting the confidence and determination of the troops to cross the river.
They then found a guide at Dai Gong Mountain, and under the guidance of the guide, they marched 200 miles to meet the local guerrillas at the town of Yunling, the former headquarters of the New Fourth Army.
With the assistance of the guerrillas and the local masses, the cross-river advance brigade first quickly set up more than 20 work stations, explored the enemy's numbers, troop deployment, and firepower allocation along the river in great detail, and continuously sent them back to the Headquarters of the Twenty-seventh Army and the General Front Committee through radio.
On the evening of April 20, when the large troops of the Twenty-seventh Army officially crossed the river, the advance brigade was divided into multiple teams, sending signals, seizing positions, occupying mountains, and breaking the enemy's nest, so that the enemy troops in Jiangnan suffered a lot, and successfully completed the task of disturbing the enemy's army's morale and cooperating with the main force to cross the river.
The outstanding performance of the advance brigade was highly praised by the Military Department and the General Front Committee, and they were praised as a strange soldier who bravely shouldered heavy burdens and lived up to the expectations of the people, and since then they have been famous in military history.
When the classic film "Crossing the River Reconnaissance" came out, many people could not imagine that the people and things that led to this meritorious soldier and this legendary war history were actually the founding lieutenant general Guo Huaruo and the plate of leeks.