"The Red Army is not afraid of expeditions and difficulties, and it is only idle in thousands of rivers and mountains." Almost everyone can recite this poem, but the story he tells behind it is a lifelong pain for our countrymen. When the Luding Bridge was captured, there were twenty-two heroes who formed a squad to take the lead for the soldiers behind them, but after the incident at Luding Bridge passed, the twenty-two heroes did not know the whereabouts of the other eighteen people except for the four soldiers who died, and everything did not find a clue until forty years later.
What really happened when the Luding Bridge was captured, and why didn't the clues to these 22 heroes be found until 40 years later? What exactly did they encounter? The content of this issue will take you into history and see the deeds of the soldiers who heroically seized the bridge during the Long March of the Red Army!
The fifth anti-encirclement and suppression campaign failed, and the Red Army was forced to march
In October 1934, due to the "Left" dogmatic thinking of Bogu, the leader of the Red Army in the Central Soviet Region, and his aggressive offensive strategy, our army ended in defeat in the Fifth War of Anti-Encirclement and Suppression against Chiang Kai-shek. Forced to look at the map in front of them, the leader of our party finally decided after discussion and discussion to change the original planned route and instead march towards western Hunan and thus embarked on the road of the Long March.
On October 10, the headquarters of the Red Army quietly set out from Ruijin and led more than 86,000 soldiers to carry out a strategic transfer. However, at this time, the Party Central Committee did not realize the "Left" ideology of Li De, Bogu, Wang Ming and others, so the command in the army was still controlled by these people.
In November 1934, Chiang Kai-shek suddenly changed his strategic decision and decided to take advantage of this opportunity to inflict a heavy blow on the Red Army. He ordered five divisions of the Gui Army to snipe at Quanzhou, Xing'an, Guanyang, and other areas, while the four divisions of the Guangdong Army were guarding the guangdong-Xianggui border, responsible for preventing the Red Army from moving south, and ordered Wang Jialie, the commander-in-chief of Guizhou Province, who opposed our party, to send powerful troops to intercept them.
This battle was the most tragic struggle in the history of the Red Army, in just a few days, our army was instantly reduced from more than 86,000 people to more than 30,000 people, at that time the entire Xiang River was blood red, every few steps you can see a corpse, blood flowing into a river, piles of corpses, reflecting the whole sky is blood red, our army finally successfully tore through the last line of defense of Chiang Kai-shek's army, successfully crossed the Xiang River.
The price of this time was undoubtedly enormous, and all the soldiers were desperate to smash this encirclement into a crack with their lives and blood, crushing Chiang Kai-shek's attempt, but the sharp reduction in the number of people after the war finally attracted the suspicion and dissatisfaction of the people about the military line commanded by Li De, Bogu, and Wang Ming.
After all, having just switched strategies and suffered such a big defeat, such a strategy did make the soldiers unstable and suspicious of these leaders.
In order to solve this problem and find the root cause of the fierce victory in this campaign, the leaders of the Red Army finally convened an enlarged meeting, which is known to us as the Zunyi Conference, which is the most emblematic meeting in the history of the Red Army on the mainland, and it is precisely because of this meeting that the great leader of the mainland officially stepped onto the stage of history and led the Chinese people to one victory after another, which was a major turning point and an important beginning for turning a new page in the history of the Red Army.
The Long March, a full twenty-five thousand miles away, was taken out by the Red Army, this is not simply walking, in addition to climbing snowy mountains, crossing meadows, soldiers also have to endure the torture of hunger and thirst and illness and Chiang Kai-shek's army that may come out at any time to carry out artillery attacks and hand-to-hand combat, and many times are a minority majority, in the face of the other side's sophisticated weapons and the number of soldiers, coupled with the impact of bad weather, many soldiers have sacrificed on this road, other soldiers can survive this harsh environment, It's all about amazing willpower.
But even so, Chiang Kai-shek would not let them go like this, he knew perfectly well how strong the Red Army would become if it successfully met the division, so he would definitely go to great lengths to stop them.
The Battle of Dushu Town in November 1934 passed, the Battle of Chishui River in early 1935 also passed, and the Dadu River in May 1935 also passed, and Chiang Kai-shek, who heard the news, slapped the table in anger, suppressed the anger in his heart, and set his eyes on the Only Road of the Red Army, luding bridge.
"This time, we must take them down, I don't believe it, they can still pass this level!" After Chiang Kai-shek finished his command, he frowned and looked into the distance.
Red Army soldiers flew to capture the Luding Bridge
As we all know, Luding Bridge, also known as the Iron Rope Bridge, was built during the Kangxi Period of the Qing Dynasty, located in Luding County, Sichuan Province, and is the only bridge connecting Sichuan and Tibet in the history of the mainland. Luding Bridge is famous for its iron cable bridge because the bridge is composed of 13 iron cables.
There are cliffs everywhere, and the river below is rushing from north to south, and no one knows how deep the turbulent water below is, but there is no doubt that if you accidentally fall into the water, basically no one will survive.
Such a steep geographical location, at that time the technology was so backward, can build a bridge is already a big project, in order to build this bridge, the designers thought of a variety of ways, and finally discussed for a long time before finally finally decided to use the "rope principle" to build this chain bridge.
The total iron of this chain bridge weighs forty tons, and each of the thirteen chains is made of 862 to 997 iron chains, according to the data, the chain bridge has a total of 12,164 iron rings interlocked, the project is cumbersome, unexpected, standing on this bridge, people are like ants, for the hundreds of meters wide river and heavy chain bridge as a foil.
In May 1935, the number of the Red Army was only about 20,000 people, although at this time they had occupied such a favorable stronghold as the Dadu River, but they could not stay too long, behind Chiang Kai-shek's army was chasing after them, but there were only four small boats in front of them, three of which were still broken, and so many soldiers could not get through in a short period of time, and they had to think of a solution.
In such an urgent situation, our great leader resolutely ordered that some of our troops should be left to forcibly cross the Dadu River and part to seize the Luding Bridge.
Hearing such an order, several leaders immediately worried in their hearts, although this seizure of the Luding Bridge was the best way at the moment, but the difficulty of the Luding Bridge was too great, and the soldiers who were not careful might wash away with the current.
In the face of their worries, how could our great leader not have thought, but since the Long March, which of their battles and days has been easily spent, he firmly believes in his heart that the heroism of the warriors will overcome all the difficulties in front of them, even if it is impossible for others to complete! Only in this way can we win victory and win everything for the people.
Listening to the leader's words, several leaders finally shook their heads and sighed helplessly, which was considered to be acquiescence to this action. The soldiers' action was still very fast, and immediately after receiving the order, they began to reorganize, divided into two route armies, composed of cadres led by Liu Bocheng and Nie Rongzhen and the Red Army column, Luding Bridge was a strategic location where Chiang Kai-shek's army was stationed, and it was even more difficult to think that it was even more difficult to cross such a dangerous bridge and fight against Chiang Kai-shek's army.
The great leaders of the mainland naturally knew that it was not easy to capture the Luding Bridge, so the warriors who went there must be the strongest, so as to reduce their losses, and the warriors on this side must also help these warriors immediately after crossing the river, so that they will have the possibility of survival.
Therefore, the task of capturing the chain bridge was entrusted to Wang Kaixiang and Yang Chengwu. The warriors set off, with a look of death, but when they reached the Luding Bridge, they found that everything in front of them was far more difficult than they thought.
In order to prevent the Red Army soldiers from crossing the bridge, Chiang Kai-shek's army had already made arrangements, and they had dismantled all the wooden planks placed on the chains, leaving only a few bare chains, and the river below was rushing forward rapidly, stirring up a burst of water, which looked frightening just by looking frightening. Where this is to seize the bridge, this is clearly a confrontation with the death god running.
I have to say that this is very unfavorable to our side, and now I don't say that the bridge is difficult and easy, just to say that my enemies and secrets have already hung their lives on the door of their heads.
On May 29, after the strategic deployment of the current situation, 22 heroes began to cross the bridge with wooden planks at the risk of being discovered by the enemy, the river was torrential, the cold wind blew, the tip of the nose was full of salty breath, and the iron chains were rhythmically swinging after the slow crawling of people, which brought some danger to the lives of these fighters, but in their eyes, the flicker was firm, revealing that they were resolute and resolute, there was no fear at all, and Chiang Kai-shek wanted them to become Shi Dakai's second, it was impossible.
Halfway through, the enemy did find their tracks, and opened fire on them with their weapons, and under the attack of the fire, the soldiers not only did not flinch, but grasped the chains and moved forward quickly, and finally, with everyone's unswerving efforts, the war was finally won, and the efforts of these twenty-two heroic soldiers were indispensable.
The name of the battlefield was never known, and forty years later the trail reappeared
Mr. Peng Jialun was very interested in the deeds of these twenty-two soldiers, and he was very touched in his heart, in order to pass on their deeds and let people know their heroic deeds, Peng Jialun chose to record all the events that happened during their Long March and circulate them to the people.
Forty years later, Wang Yongmo accidentally saw the things recorded by Peng Jialun, and his heart was greatly moved, and he immediately vowed that he must find the whereabouts of these people, so that when the world remembers this matter later, he can also know who the names of these twenty-two heroic warriors are, which is also a kind of memory and admiration for those soldiers who sacrificed for the great righteousness of the country.
He was constantly searching, constantly shuttling around the world, just to find them. The Emperor did not pay his heart, and really let him find out some famous halls, there is a martyr file named Liu Zihua in the Jiangxi Memorial Hall, which clearly records that he participated in the Battle of the Chain Bridge, and was once the deputy squad leader, and later because of the war, he was scarred until he died of illness.
Having a good starting point made Wang Yongmo feel very excited in his heart, and also made him more attentive and passionate in his exploration journey. After investigation, he found Liu Zihua's wife and children, got his military diary from his family, and learned the whole process of the deeds at that time.
Finding the clues of the two warriors' lives made Wang Yongmo more determined in his heart to take the road to go, he kept looking, with the progress of science and technology, he also found twelve warriors with the help of the media and the masses, namely Liao Dazhu, Wang Haiyun, Li Youlin, Liu Jinshan, Wei Xiaosan, Liu Dagui, Li Furen, Wang Hongshan, Zhao Xiaofa, Yang Tianming and the two mentioned above.
In addition, the names of others have not been found, which has also become Wang Yongmo's regret, but he firmly believes that with the advancement of science and technology, sooner or later, the names of these warriors will be fully announced in front of everyone's eyes.
Although these soldiers have been sleeping in the land of war forever and have never seen with their own eyes what they looked like after the founding of New China, their spirit and deeds will forever be passed on to the hearts of future generations. Although the road of the Long March is full of thorns, but the Red Army survived, China survived, for today's good time, the martyrs of the past used their own flesh and blood to pave the road in front of the people, let us see for them today the appearance of the Taiping And prosperous world, all of which is indispensable to the party's command and leadership.
The stars shine, the mountains and rivers are unharmed, we were born under the red flag, grew up in the spring wind, and now China has become what they imagined, there is food, there is a house, there is a family, in this new China, we have no war, no escape, nor have we suffered humiliation from other countries, everyone's life and mentality are also showing the demeanor of a big country, the martyrs of the predecessors with flesh and blood, is the light of the new country, but also the beautiful future of new China.
For the story of the twenty-two heroic soldiers of the Long March who flew to seize the Luding Bridge, Wang Yongmo devoted himself to finding their names and whereabouts. The comments section below welcomes your enthusiastic speeches! This issue ends here, thank you for your careful reading, we will not see each other in the next issue!