Chen Geng and Lin are always the Huangpu brothers in the top of our party, and the first senior Chen Geng served as the leader of the junior Lin Zong, but in the stage of opening up the base area, Lin Zheng caught up and slowly surpassed Chen Geng.
In the later stage of the Liberation War, the identities of the two were reversed, and Chen Geng was under the command of Siye and became a subordinate of his junior brother.
Both of them have excellent military talents, but when they are combined, they do not have the effect of 1+1>2, but they are constantly arguing with each other, and the trouble is decided by the central government in the end.
And Chairman Mao, who has always attached importance to Mr. Lin, also uncharacteristically supports Chen Geng, why is this?
After the launch of the battle to cross the river in 1949, most of the Kuomintang troops were about to collapse at the touch of a button, and only Bai Chongxi of the Gui family tried in vain to resist with his own forces.
In order to completely eliminate it, the central government formulated a plan to attack south and southwest China, which was under the unified command of Lin Zong, commander of the four fields, and Xiao Ke, chief of staff of the four fields.
Out of importance, the central government temporarily placed the Chen Geng Corps, which has strong combat effectiveness in Zhongye, under the command of Siye, only hoping to succeed in one blow against Bai Chongxi's group.
When receiving the order from the central government, Chen Geng said to the cadres around him very humbly: This time we are going south with the main force of Siye, and everyone should learn more from others and respect Big Brother.
Because Chen Geng likes to joke by nature, the people around him are also infected, and ask him why he has become a leader now because he once participated in the revolution earlier and held a higher position before? Chen Geng was not annoyed, and replied with a smile: Because people are making progress faster than me!
However, a few days later, this peaceful atmosphere was shattered by an order.
General Lin asked the Fourth Corps in Nanchang to quickly cross the Ganjiang River westward, enter Hunan through Yichun and Pingxiang, threaten the front line of Liling, Hengyang, and Zhuzhou, and respond to the frontal attack of the four fields, and strive for a decisive battle with Bai Chongxi in Changsha or Hengyang.
This order was very detailed, and even the march route of each corps under the Fourth Corps had been planned, as long as it was done step by step.
But Chen Geng disagreed with it after seeing it, he felt that the current Siye had given enough pressure on the front, and Bai Chongxi's department did not show the courage to fight for life and death in Hunan, and it was likely that he would retreat in a hurry after being defeated.
In this case, the Fourth Corps rushed over according to the order, and it would not be able to stop the Gui Army, so it was best to let the Fourth Corps cooperate with the Fifteenth Corps to go south to Guangdong, cut off Bai Chongxi's escape route, and then fight back violently.
Although it seems to have lengthened the battle line, it is actually to pull out a net for the Gui family and completely encircle it, and it is only a matter of time before it is completely annihilated.
Chen Geng quickly called back, saying, "Our department will be ten thousand people immediately, and if you make a slight move, you will be discovered by Bai Chongxi." At that time, if he abandons Hunan and retreats to Liangguang, it will be unfavorable to our army in the next stage of operations. For this reason, our department should quickly move south, occupy Guangdong, and block Bai Chongxi's sea retreat."
Mr. Lin liked to seek stability in the war, so he did not take Chen Geng's suggestion, but gave an order to the Fourth Corps again, asking them to arrive at the intended combat position as soon as possible. Chen Geng had no choice but to report his battle plan to Liu Deng of Erye and ask them to forward it to Chairman Mao.
After thinking about it, the chairman supported Chen Geng's opinion, the two sentences of the army are indeed too easy to scare away Bai Chongxi, if the Gui army is defeated too quickly and flees by sea, it will be difficult for our side to concentrate on annihilating it.
The Central Military Commission sent a telegram back to both the Siye Corps and the Fourth Corps, specifically pointing out that Chen Geng would take unified command of the Fourth Corps and the 15th Corps for the southward movement to Guangdong. This means that Chen Geng has more autonomy and can no longer unilaterally follow Mr. Lin's instructions.
Immediately, Chen Geng led his troops to cross the border between Jiangxi and Guangdong and rushed straight to Shaoguan, aiming to cut off the Guangdong-Han line and prevent Bai Chongxi's troops from fleeing to Guangzhou.
Yu Hanmou in Guangdong was very frightened when he heard the news, and immediately asked his subordinates to abandon the Shaoguan South Talks and prepare to set up a defense line in Guangzhou, however, at this time, the national army had no desire to fight, and the People's Liberation Army liberated Guangzhou on October 14.
The news of Guangzhou's change of hands caused a great shock to Bai Chongxi, who uncharacteristically no longer let his subordinates flee, but began to gather heavy troops on the Hunan and Guizhou borders to prepare for a decisive battle.
In Guilin and the area to the north, Bai Chongxi arranged two corps headed by Huang Jie and Liu Jiashu in an attempt to block our army from Guangxi.
As soon as he changed, the People's Liberation Army also changed, and while letting the main force of Siye advance, Mr. Lin also ordered the Fourth Corps to stop pursuing Yu Hanmou's group, and turned to Shaoguan and Yingde to the west to enter Guizhou to join Siye, preparing to annihilate Bai Chongxi's troops in the border area of Hunan and Guizhou.
There is no problem with the order given by Noji to the Fourth Corps this time, at this time there are too many routs of the national army, and the pursuit of the Fourth Corps has faintly gone deeper, if the enemy grits his teeth and gathers to fight a counterattack, it is likely to repeat the defeat of Qingshuping.
Therefore, letting the Fourth Corps encircle the Gui system is also a kind of concern for them by Mr. Lin.
The central government affirmed Lin's decision, rearranged the deployment, and launched the Guangxi campaign under the unified command of 400,000 People's Liberation Army, including the Fourth Corps, under the unified command of Siye, and Chen Geng led the Fourth Corps to the north of Lianjiang and Xinyi.
At this time, the Fifth Corps of Erye liberated Guiyang, and Bai Chongxi was completely panicked. He finally understood that he could not defeat the People's Liberation Army and began to prepare for a large-scale escape.
The retreat to Yungui was cut off, and Bai Chongxi set his sights on Chen Geng's Fourth Corps, wanting to open a retreat route from here to Hainan Island and Vietnam.
On November 16, General Lin issued an order to all corps to encircle and annihilate the main force of Bai Chongxi's army, and on the 22nd, Guilin was declared liberated.
Bai Chongxi urgently ordered Zhang Gan to lead the Third Corps to rush to Yulin and the Beiliu Line in Nanning, and at the same time let the main force of Lu Daoyuan's 11th Corps assemble near Rongxian County and make an attack posture, so as to cooperate with Zhang Gan's military combat operations.
On the 23rd, the Lu Daoyuan Corps launched a feint attack on the 43rd Army of Siye, and when the news reached the Siye Headquarters, Mr. Lin thought that Bai Chongxi had changed the direction of the main attack here, so he urgently ordered Chen Geng to transfer three armies north to encircle and annihilate the Lu Daoyuan Corps, leaving only the 39th Division of the 13th Army to block the enemy in Lianjiang.
Chen Geng did not approve of such a deployment, he believed that Bai Chongxi really wanted to fight a decisive battle, and he had an opportunity earlier, so why should he wait until the end of the road?
At this time, if the main force of the Fourth Corps was transferred north, the remaining division would not be able to stop Bai Chongxi's hundreds of thousands of troops at all. Even if the Lu Daoyuan Corps can be completely annihilated, it will be a big loss because of a small one.
Therefore, the main force of the Fourth Corps must not go, so it is stationed on the Leizhou Peninsula to lock Bai Chongxi's retreat, although it will face a lot of pressure, but when Siye arrives, Ren Bai Chongxi will not be able to escape by any means.
After Chen Geng telegraphed his idea to Mr. Lin, he did not get consent, and the two had an argument again, but Mr. Lin never changed his mind. In desperation, Chen Geng once again crossed the level to report to the Central Committee and expressed his thoughts.
The chairman agreed with Chen Geng's opinion, but this time he did not give an order directly to Chen Geng, but put the power in the hands of Mr. Lin and asked Mr. Lin to give the order. In this way, it not only took care of Lin Biao's face, but also allowed Chen Geng to continue his deployment.
Later facts proved that Chen Geng's strategy was very correct, and Bai Chongxi's troops really fled in the direction of the Leizhou Peninsula, but fortunately, the Fourth Corps held here and did not let it succeed, and finally the Gui army was completely annihilated.
In fact, Mr. Lin and Chen Geng have no personal grudges, they are purely different in their analysis of the war situation, their starting point is for the public, and the matter has passed, and the relationship between the two is not bad later.