#朝鲜 #
In the Fourth Campaign to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, if they heeded Han Xianchu's advice and first attacked Pingli and then attacked Hengcheng, would the volunteer army still lose? Will the outcome of the campaign change?
The War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea lasted three years, during which a total of five battles were fought, and the Sniper Battle of Hengcheng in the fourth campaign was originally a big victory, and the Volunteer Army annihilated more than 10,000 UN troops, with a good record. Unfortunately, before the warriors could rejoice for long, the battle of Pingli that followed immediately after them poured cold water on everyone. The U.S. army not only succeeded in defending, but also took advantage of the victory to pursue and pushed north for a long time. It was also because of this ineffective operation that Mr. Peng had to organize the volunteer army to regroup and continue to carry out the fifth campaign.
As for the Hengcheng Blockade Battle and the Battle of Pingli, there has always been a point of controversy: when Han Xianchu advocated first attacking Pingli and then attacking Hengcheng, Deng Hua disagreed with him, and It was difficult for General Manager Peng to make a decision before he personally came to the front, so that they could make up their own minds, and the result was a fiasco, if they listened to Han Xianchu's advice and waved the division first, could they reverse the defeat of this battle?
In fact, there are only two differences between Pingli and Hengcheng, one is that the garrison troops are different, and the other is that they are in different positions. Well-equipped U.S. troops were stationed around Tsuhei-ri, while those left behind in Yokoseong were South Korean troops with low military literacy. The strength of the enemy army is a key factor in determining whether the volunteer army can win the war, and it is naturally more laborious to fight with the US army, and the South Korean army is much easier to deal with, after all, their soldiers have not undergone much professional military training at all, and have always been transparent in the Korean War. The US army is accustomed to using fierce artillery attacks to open the way, they have a lot of money and fierce firepower, and it is still more difficult to clean up.
From this point of view, wouldn't it be more cost-effective to attack Hengcheng than to attack Pingpingli? Few casualties are expected and less time consuming. However, according to the founding general Han Xianchu, it was indeed easy to attack Hengcheng, but it was precisely because of this ease that the battle became meaningless, not only did not play any role in promoting the development of the war, but also hit the grass and snakes, so that the United Nations army could be prepared in advance, and it would be even more difficult to attack Pingli at that time.
Pingli is both a hub and a dot, there are traffic routes passing nearby, the strategic position is extremely important, once it is taken, it can break through the enemy's western defense line, echo with other theaters, and affect the entire war situation. Therefore, it is better not to waste time and directly concentrate forces to attack key areas and directly hit the key points.
This did sound very reasonable, but at that time there was another completely opposite strategic proposition in the volunteer army, that is, General Deng Hua's proposal to "first fight Hengcheng to boost morale, and then gnaw hard bones to beat Pingli." Deng Hua believed that although the strategic location of Hengcheng was not as important as that of Pingpingli, the strength of the victorious garrison was weak, and the possibility of winning the battle was very high, and the volunteer army had been running on the Korean battlefield for a long time, and it was in urgent need of a victory to inspire people. There are two battalions of AMERICAN troops stationed in Pingli, the defensive strength is quite strong, it is difficult to quickly break through in a short period of time, the marching army pays attention to the speed of the soldiers, the longer the time drags on, the more unfavorable it is to our army, in case both sides cannot take it down, it is not worth the loss. Therefore, Deng Hua advocated hitting Hengcheng first, breaking through the weak and the strong one by one.
Although Han Xianchu and Deng Hua disagreed, the starting points of both were good, but their respective command styles were different. In fact, the fourth campaign was originally a continuation of the third campaign, was hastily launched to clear up the previous legacy problems, and no one can predict what kind of combat results can be achieved.
At that time, the Volunteer Army had just experienced three large-scale battles, the troops lost a lot of troops, and only 210,000 of the hundreds of thousands of troops were left, although there were still North Korean People's Army assisting as allies, but the actual combat ability of the other side was not strong, and the Chinese and North Korean troops had to face the United Nations Army with well-armed weapons and equipment, such as aircraft and tanks.
Ridgway did have two brushes, and he carefully studied the combat laws of the volunteer army, and soon found that our army was now facing the dilemma of lack of manpower and insufficient logistical resources, so he quickly attacked at the right time, and also invented many combat strategies such as the full moon offensive and the prayer offensive. The prayer offensive is to take a week, that is, seven days a week as the combat cycle, the logistics base of the volunteer army is in the north, the vanguard troops generally only carry seven days of grain and grass supplies to march forward, Ridgway let the United Nations army ambush attack a few days ago, the middle detour to accumulate strength, wait until the last few days the volunteer army ran out of food, and then jump out to fight to the death.
Before the third campaign was completely over, Ridgway gathered 16 divisions plus 3 brigades to wear down the vitality of the volunteer army. The enemy army was fierce, and General Manager Peng could not continue to let the troops rest, and could only carry out the fourth battle in a hurry. The beginning was so hasty, how difficult the fourth battle was to be fought can be imagined, the troops are insufficient, can only concentrate their strength on fighting one, whether it is to fight Hengcheng first or to fight Pingli first, the volunteer army wants to win the final victory, it is necessary to pay a big blood, but the first fight in Pingli can take the lead, take advantage of the fact that the US army is defenseless, and preemptively take the next blood, and the balance of victory will also be more inclined to our army.
