At about 5 p.m. on May 16, 1947, the reorganized 74th Division, known as one of the "five main forces" of the Kuomintang "Yulin Army", was completely destroyed in Menglianggu, Shandong. According to the "Battle History of the Third Field Army of the Chinese People's Liberation Army", the Battle of Menglianggu annihilated "1 regiment of the reorganized 74th Division and the reorganized 83rd Division, with a total of more than 32,000 people" ("1717 dead officers, 11253 soldiers, 1392 wounded officers, 7479 soldiers, 167 missing officers, and 3315 soldiers").
Looking at the various reinforcements of the entire 74th Division, the three units belonging to the 7th Army, the Reorganized 25th Division, and the Reorganized 83rd Division were the closest and the most promising units to break the siege, and as for the other lines, due to the long distance, it was unlikely that the three units mentioned earlier would arrive at Menglianggu even if they used all their strength. Therefore, these 3 troops are given high hopes! So how many troops did the Seventh Army send at that time?
At that time, the 25th Division and the 83rd Division were the two closest units to the 74th Division, but they could not quickly "move closer" to the 74th Division, so the commander of the 1st Corps, Tombaugh, immediately gave the order to the 7th Army, which was slightly farther away, to support.
The 7th Army received the task of relieving the siege at about 8 a.m. on May 15, when the 7th Army was on the right flank of the entire 74th Division. Tang Bourne originally meant "to be organized by the Seventh Army" and "to coordinate the operations of the Eighty-third Division". When Zhong Ji received the order, he thought that Tang Enbo only asked the 7th Army to send "one unit" and "response", and did not say how much it was sent or how strong it was to break the siege. In view of the factional contradictions between the New Gui clan and the Central Army, as well as many factors such as wanting to see the jokes of the Central Army, Zhong Ji decided to send only one regiment of the 172nd Division to carry out this task after discussing with Li Benyi. (Remarks: Zhong Ji, then commander of the 7th Army, was a comprehensive management talent cultivated by the New Gui Department. In Zhong Ji's military career, he worked in education, training, staff, supply, aviation, etc., but lacked long-term experience in leading troops. In fact, Zhong Ji was appointed commander of the 7th Army only to improve his resume in leading soldiers, so that he could continue to develop into a higher class. Therefore, the actual military leader of the 7th Army at that time was Deputy Commander Li Benyi.
Li Benyi is a tiger general who can recruit good warriors in the new Gui clan. During the warlord melee and the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, he experienced hundreds of battles and had rich combat experience, but because of the fact that he had privately led the Gui army into Nanjing to be surrendered during the victory of the War of Resistance, Chiang Kai-shek was furious, which led to his hopeless promotion to military commander for a long period of time, but also because of the lawsuit over the trespassing in Nanjing, there was a danger of being sent to a military court at any time. )
When Gu Zhutong, commander-in-chief of the army, learned of this situation, he hurriedly ordered the 7th Army to go all out to break the siege. Even so, the 7th Army only sent all of the 172nd Division that night to "coordinate" with the entire 83rd Division to "reinforce Meng Lianggu" on the same night. However, a day later, the entire 74th Division was completely destroyed, and the 7th Army's siege did not actually play any role.
Chiang Kai-shek was extremely angry at the sabotage of the 7th Army. As a result, Li Benyi, who had a "case background" and was responsible for the actual military command responsibility at the time, became a scapegoat, and was eventually arrested and sentenced to fifteen years in prison, deprived of public power for ten years, and exempted from office and honor." Despite this, Li Benyi still received the help of Bai Chongxi, Xia Wei, Zhong Ji and others after the sentence was pronounced, and after being "released on bail", he was transferred back to the 7th Army in the form of "Dai Sin Tugong" to continue as deputy commander, and then became the last commander of the 7th Army after Zhong Ji. On December 16, 1949, Li Benyi was defeated and captured in Guangxi, and was later shot on August 24, 1951.
Chen Yi, then commander of the East China Field Army, once wrote a poem describing the fierce battle: "Meng Lianggu got on the ghost god number, and the Seventy-fourth Division fled without land." The signal flew and the stars were chaotic, and the lighting was full of fire. The knife bushes flew to the top of the mountain, and the blood rained wet battle robes. I am glad to see that the thieves are exhausted, and our army is a hero. ”