Su Yu, the first general of the founding country, is he qualified to be a marshal?
preface
Su Yu was one of the most outstanding double stars in the Liberation War, and even the chairman did not hesitate to praise: "For the victory in the Huaihai Campaign, Su Yu must remember the first-class merit", and even Lin Zong admired Su Yu very much, often saying that he was "a god who fought a war and went to mortals"!
When the title was awarded in 1955, everyone thought that Su Yuhui, who had made great achievements, would be awarded the rank of "marshal", but he was only a "general", what was going on?
1. Outstanding military merits
In the course of the 20-year Chinese revolution, a large number of outstanding generals emerged on the mainland, among which Su Yu and Lin Zong were called "genius military generals", and in their long revolutionary careers, the two had outstanding achievements, even the other nine founding marshals were inferior to the two in terms of battle merits.
Especially during the Liberation War, the PLA annihilated Chiang Kai-shek's 8 million army in one fell swoop in only three years, of which Su Yu and Lin Zong could be described as the most meritorious contributors.
According to incomplete statistics, Su Yu led a total of 134 important battles during the Liberation War. When the Liberation War began in 1946, Su Yu won seven battles and seven victories in the Soviet-Chinese campaign, which was his famous battle.
The seven battles of the Soviet-Chinese campaign lasted one and a half months, and Su Yu led 30,000 Central China Field Army in one go, confronting Chiang Kai-shek's 120,000 artillery elite generals at Xuanjiabao, south of Rugao, Haian, Fort Lee, Dinglin, Shaobo, and Huang Road, annihilating 51,000 enemy troops.
In these seven battles, Su Yu's command was very accurate, according to the terrain and the distribution position of the Central China Field Army, there were attack, defense, field battle, fortification, long-distance attack, and waiting for work, it can be said that Su Yu always controlled the rapidly changing initiative of the Soviet-Chinese campaign, mobilizing and destroying the enemy in the movement.
The Soviet-Chinese campaign basically covered various forms of combat in various sports warfare, and more importantly, Su Yu's actual battle and victory on the battlefield perfectly answered a major strategic question of how our army should defeat the national army in the war of liberation.
In the first two months of the outbreak of the Liberation War, only the Soviet-Chinese Campaign was the earliest and most successful battle, and there were basically no beautiful achievements in other places, and even suffered some defeats.
The Soviet-Chinese campaign commanded by Su Yu was used by the chairman as an example of mobile warfare, and even sent a telegram to the commanders of major strategic regions to introduce the experience of the Soviet-Chinese campaign:
"In the overall inferior situation, concentrating absolutely superior forces to attack the enemy, breaking through one by one and fighting invincible, morale is high, coupled with flexible command, attack and defense of the unexpected national army is losing and retreating, Su Yu's battle has taught us very well the experience of sports warfare, and I hope that all districts will follow suit."
It can be said that the victory in the Soviet-Chinese campaign marked the success of the entire initial strategic period of the war of liberation,
Although it was small in scale, it was of great significance as the first victory in the Liberation War, and the soldiers' flexibility in attacking enemy forces fully demonstrated Su Yu's extraordinary military capabilities.
In the first year of the Liberation War, our army annihilated a total of 1.12 million nationalist troops, of which the East China Theater commanded by Su Yu annihilated 434,000 Kuomintang troops, accounting for one-third of the total number of enemies.
During the entire Liberation War, Chiang Kai-shek was annihilated by our army with 8 million troops, of which the East China Field Army led by Su Yu killed as many as 2.45 million enemies.
There is no doubt that Su Yu does have the qualifications to be awarded the rank of marshal by military merit, which is one of the reasons for the controversy that "Su Yu has the qualification to be awarded marshal" so far.
Second, missed opportunities
In fact, Su Yu had three opportunities to evaluate the marshal, of which the missed mistake of resisting US aggression and aiding Korea made the old comrades of Sanye feel the most regretful.
In 1945, just after the victory of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, Chairman Mao and Premier Zhou discussed and decided to establish the Central China Military Region to manage and centrally manage the troops in Central China.
The first candidate for the chairman was Su Yu, who had the title of "Chang Sheng General", and appointed Zhang Dingcheng as the deputy commander of the Central China Military Region.
After hearing this, Su Yu hurriedly came to Zhongnanhai: "Chairman, I really can't take on the big responsibility,
The experience and experience are very short, and it is really difficult to take up the position of ascending to the sky in one step, not to mention that Zhang Dingcheng is my old superior, how can I step on the superior's position and still manage the affairs of the superior."
The chairman comforted: "What is this, no one is born to know everything, you can learn slowly, the position is higher than the old superior, it means that he teaches well, Su Yu, you don't have too many worries, the position is just a proxy for the exercise of power, the bigger the position, the more you have to pay for the people."
Su Yu still felt that it was difficult for him to take up the big job, and hoped that the chairman would take back his order and appoint Zhang Dingcheng as the commander of the Central China Military Region.
Chairman Mao saw that Su Yu's attitude was very resolute, and he also felt that he could be allowed to temper for a few more years, so he adopted Su Yu's advice and appointed Zhang Dingcheng, who was very senior, as the commander of the Central China Military Region, and Su Yu as the deputy commander to assist his old superiors, absorbing more experience and growing up as soon as possible.
Su Yu except that the same thing happened to the commander in 1948 except 1945.
In May 1948, Chairman Mao merged the Shandong Field Army and the Central China Field Army to form the East China Field Army, and Chairman Mao's favorite commander was Su Yu, who had made great achievements in battle, and also issued a "military order" to Su Yu to stimulate his greatest combat potential.
In order to allow Su Yu to run in with the East China Field Army as soon as possible, the chairman made up his mind to dispatch Chen Yi to the Central Plains Field Army.
At this time, Su Yu repeatedly stated that "Commander Chen is the backbone of the East China Field Army, and the army cannot be left without a commander for a day"; under Su Yu's repeated refusals, the chairman had to agree with him, dispatch Chen Yi to the Central Plains Field Army, and retain his post as commander and political commissar of the East China Field Army.
However, Su Yu's outstanding military talent was obvious to all, and he was appointed acting commander and acting political commissar of Huaye, and presided over the work of the East China Field Army in an all-round way.
After that, Su Yu led Hua Ye to participate in the Huaihai Campaign, with 600,000 troops against Chiang Kai-shek's 800,000 elite soldiers, annihilated the 74th Division of the Nationalist Army in one fell swoop with the fierce tiger's heart-pounding style, cut off Chiang Kai-shek's arm, and then annihilated Huang Baitao, Huang Wei, and Du Yuming, which played a crucial role in the southward movement of the troops.
3. Awarding qualifications
Although Su Yu had distinguished himself in the Liberation War, he was not eligible for the first title in 1955.
At that time, it was clearly stipulated that the specifications for the selection of marshals must meet five major conditions:
1. Participating in the creation or leadership of the people's armed forces;
2. During the Red Army period, he held a leading position at the corps or corps level;
3. During the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, he held leading posts at the army level of the Eighth Route Army and the New Fourth Army or leading posts in military regions at the level of base areas;
4. During the Liberation War, leading positions in the field army;
5. At the time of conferring the title, he shall serve as vice chairman of the National Defense Commission and member of the Central Military Commission.
It can be said that few people meet these five regulations at the same time, Su Yu only began to rise rapidly during the Liberation War, did not meet the first three of the five regulations, and in 1955, when the rank was assessed, Su Yu was the chief of the general staff, did not serve as vice chairman of the Ministry of National Defense Committee, nor was he a member of the Central Military Commission.
Another of the most important reasons is that after Chen Yi was selected as a marshal, Su Yu basically had no chance with "marshal".
The consideration of the rank of marshal has never been based solely on battle merit, but on the comprehensive evaluation of seniority, virtue, army balance and many other aspects, and it is precisely because of this consideration that after Chen Yi, who represented the guerrillas of the Southern Red Army, the New Fourth Army and the Third Field Army, was named marshal, Su Yu's qualifications to be re-evaluated were minimal.
It can be said that from the moment of the reorganization of the Eighth Route Army, the basic candidates for the ten marshals have been preliminarily decided, and the level of military merit only affects the ranking.
epilogue
Although Su Yu shined in the Liberation War, and even his military talent at the level of "immortals" was beyond the reach of others, his qualifications during the Red Army and the Anti-Japanese War were not outstanding, and he did not make significant military merits.
The 1955 conferral was generally relatively fair, and Su Yu's ability to become the first of the ten generals was the greatest affirmation of his military talent.