In the face of strong enemies in Korea, India, and Vietnam, this unit performed extremely well, making the opponents on the battlefield complain endlessly, and was praised by the enemy as the most capable unit of the PLA.
[160th Division Anti-aircraft Artillery Unit]
This unit is the 160th Division of the 54th Army of the People's Liberation Army, which is the ace division of the ace army of the Chinese Army.
The gold content of the whole game
In fact, before the founding of the People's Republic of China, the 160th Division was already one of the backbone of the people's army, and the predecessor of the 160th Division was the 1st Security Brigade of the Northeast Military Region, which appeared in 1945.
[The 160th Division is full of old Eighth Route 1 with extremely rich combat experience]
Therefore, the performance of the 1st Security Brigade in the Northeast Battlefield is quite eye-catching, and these veterans who have come out of the War of Resistance have extremely strong combat effectiveness, and it can be said that they have penetrated China's territory from north to south.
The Northeast Military District also has a high internal evaluation of this unit, calling it the main division, which is especially good at blasting tasks. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, the Korean War broke out, and the 160th Division was responsible for the defense of the Northeast, so it did not go to Korea for the first time.
In 1953, the front-line troops began to rotate, and the 160th Division finally got the opportunity to go abroad to fight, and they took over the defense of the famous 39th Army and the 115th Division to defend in the Longtanli area.
【Volunteers during the Korean War】
Although the war was not long before the end of the war, the US-ROK coalition still had the illusion of turning the war around, so it had been launching a fierce attack on the defense area of the 160th Division, but the 160th Division still relied on its tenacious fighting style to not lose an inch of territory.
And after the Jincheng counterattack began, the 160th Division became one of the main attacking forces. The Jincheng Counterattack had a unique position throughout the Korean War, and this battle showed both China and the United States how terrifying the fighting power of the volunteers who fought the rich war was.
Taking the 160th Division as an example, this unit broke through the area jointly defended by the four main divisions of the South Korean Army head-on with friendly forces, annihilating more than 1,000 enemies.
[The South Korean army in the US-South Korea coalition appears to be stretched]
The 160th Division also produced quite a lot of advanced individuals in the battle, which can be said to have drawn a good end to the Korean War and completely destroyed the delusion of the US-South Korean coalition forces.
Professionally printed troops
The 54th Army went to Tibet to garrison after returning from Korea, and the 160th Division was naturally among them, which also laid the groundwork for its participation in the Sino-Indian border war. Since the 50s, India has not hidden its aggressive ambitions for the Tibetan region of the mainland.
【Indian Army】
Behind the large-scale rebellion in Tibet was the operation of the Indian government and the CIA, but fortunately, the 160th Division reacted decisively and quelled the rebellion with thunderous means, and the 160th Division at that time also became the most experienced unit in fighting on the mainland plateau.
So he participated in the famous Battle of Walong. At that time, the Indian army against the 160th Division was the so-called ace 11th Brigade, which had fought in the European theater of World War II, and had rich combat experience, and it was a full set of British weapons, and the level of equipment was not low.
Of course, the 160th Division obviously does not accept this set, and there are many ace troops from other countries that it has beaten on the battlefield, not to mention the little-known Indian army.
【Brave and fearless PLA soldiers】
However, the battle of Warong does have a certain degree of difficulty, because the Indian army has already launched a defense here and built a fairly complete and systematic defense system.
However, the 160th Division did not believe in this evil, and the past experience on the battlefield showed one thing: the harder the bones, the more they had to gnaw, and once the enemy's belief in victory was defeated, the next battle would be better fought.
The 160th Division chose to fight close to them, and the Indian Army touched their forward positions without knowing it, and after the battle began, the Indian Army completely became a headless fly, and the 160th Division completely crushed its will to fight in a short period of time.
[The People's Liberation Army won a complete victory]
The 11th Brigade, which had a scale of more than 2,000 people, was eaten clean by the 160th Division in one day, and the entire system was annihilated by the PLA.
The Battle of Warong not only lost the Indian army's trump card, but also stunned the Indian army's top brass, who were completely unable to understand the PLA's mobile combat capability on the plateau, and did not dare to take the initiative to launch an offensive again.
The 160th Division displayed national and military prestige in the first battle, and won a complete victory in the self-defense counterattack against India.
Beat the white-eyed wolf
If the 160th Division had been stationed in Tibet, it would certainly not have been able to catch up with the self-defense and counterattack against Vietnam, but since the 70s of the last century, the 160th Division has been transferred to Henan to engage in construction, and it has been transferred from a first-line combat unit to a second-line state of rest and recuperation.
After the outbreak of the self-defense counterattack against Vietnam in 1979, the Central Military Commission remembered this warlike division again.
[Self-defense counterattack against Vietnam]
After a short period of pre-war training and preparation, the 160th Division rushed to the Sino-Vietnamese border in Guangxi and became a major unit in the Eastern Front Army.
The danger of the battlefield in Vietnam is no less than that of North Korea, and the 160 th Division has been disarmed and returned to the field for so many years, and it stands to reason that there will be a relatively large decline in combat effectiveness, but the results of actual combat have proved that the 160 Division is unreasonable to be able to fight.
In the Battle of Cao Ping, the 160th Division conquered the Queva area around Cao Ping in one fell swoop and annihilated more than 300 Vietnamese troops.
[The People's Liberation Army on the battlefield in Vietnam]
After the end of the main battle in the urban area of Gao Ping, the 160th Division was responsible for the public security battle in the urban area to eliminate the remnants of the enemy, and successively annihilated more than 700 enemies.
Although the 160th Division did not undertake the main task of attacking fortifications in the Vietnam battlefield as in the past, its combat intensity was not low.
The Vietnamese army was originally a contingent that regarded guerrilla warfare as its main tactical tactic, and the 160 Division's ability to gain an advantage in counter-guerrilla operations was quite a valuable performance.
[The Vietnamese army is very good at fighting guerrilla warfare]
After returning from Vietnam, the 160th Division also unlocked an achievement that no other unit had ever unlocked, that is, it participated in all foreign wars after the founding of New China.
Sources:
[1] Liu Liqin.A brief history of the 54th Army of the Chinese People's Liberation Army[J].Military History,1992(5):49.)