In the spring and summer of 1947, after more than a year of fighting, Chiang Kai-shek lost 100 brigades, but for the CCP, the situation was still grim.
Chiang Kai-shek had hoped for a quick victory and the elimination of the CCP in three months, but this was not done, and instead adopted a strategy of focusing on the offensive and designed a large pincer offensive. The focus is on two ends: northern Shaanxi and Shandong. On the battlefield in Shandong, he concentrated 56 brigades and 400,000 people to focus on Huaye's body, and on February 15, Chen Yi led his troops to withdraw from Linyi. In northern Shaanxi, he concentrated 33 brigades and 220,000 men. On March 19, all CCP organs withdrew from Yan'an. In this regard, Liu Bocheng said:
Lao Jiang thought that from the coastal road and Jinpu Road in Shandong to the Great Wall, and from northern Shaanxi along the Yulin and Suiyuan lines, he also hit the Great Wall. Isn't this a pair of pliers? These big pliers are clamped down and cut off the northeast first, and his world will be long live. ”
The problem is the middle of these two ends – the pliers' hinges of the pliers. What did Chiang Kai-shek rely on to hold on? Relying on the Yellow River, he relied on the Yellow River to carry out key defenses. For this reason, Chiang Kai-shek claimed that this "B" shaped Yellow River formation was "the Yellow River strategy of destroying the communist army."
The Huayuankou Yellow River Helong project in northwest Zhengzhou was completed in March. Chiang Kai-shek violated the agreement between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party by releasing water ahead of schedule to return the Yellow River to its original course. The surging Yellow River, from the junction of Shaanxi, Jin, and Henan provinces, to Jinan, Shandong, is 1,000 kilometers long, and Chiang Kai-shek believes that the 1,000 kilometers of the Yellow River is worth 400,000 troops, which is enough to block the army of Liu Deng in Shanxi, Hebei, Shanxi, and Henan, and cut off Liu Deng's army from Chen (Yi) Su (Yu) army, and break each one. Mao Zedong discerned his purpose and said:
"What he is planning is to annihilate Chen Su first, and then annihilate Liu Deng. ”
Chiang Kai-shek did indeed plan and deploy in this way.
He used Liu Ruming's two divisions to defend the 500-kilometer river from Kaifeng to Jinan, and the other division moved in the Jiaxiang area. He said to his subordinates: "The Yellow River is wide and deep, how can the communist army get by, three divisions are enough to defend." ”
Mao Zedong said: "Chiang Kai-shek had to ensure the two key points in the east and west, and at the same time garrison many other places, but in fact, he could not get more troops. We can make a breakthrough in his Yellow River strategy in one fell swoop. ”
Chiang Kai-shek's formation, Liu Bocheng said vividly: "It is very similar to a dumbbell, thick at both ends and thin in the middle, and its central part has become the vital and weak part." ”
Mao Zedong also saw this, so he wisely decided that Liu Deng's army would first cross the Yellow River south, advance into the Central Plains, turn the entire tide of the war, shift from strategic defense to strategic offensive, and seize the Central Plains. Moreover, he seized this "middle" weakness of Chiang Kai-shek's deployment and demanded that Liu Deng's army "implement a breakthrough in the center".
For this reason, Mao Zedong's deployment was to "cooperate with the three armies and contain the two wings": Liu Deng was the front army, which was directly approaching the Dabie Mountains; Chen Yi and Su Yuhuaye's main force was the first army on the left and the rear, and advanced into the Sulu-Henan-Anhui region, and Chen Geng and Xie Fuzhi led the other two columns and one army of Liu Deng's army as the right rear army and advanced into western Henan. Between the Jiang (Yangtze River), Huai (Huai River), River (Yellow River), and Han (Han River), the three armies formed a "product" shaped formation, and each other was horns, maneuvering to annihilate the enemy, and chasing the Central Plains. Among them, Liu Deng took the lead in hitting the outside line, advancing into Dabie Mountain, threatening Nanjing and Wuhan. The three armies of Liu Deng, Chen Su, and Chen Xie together led the war to Chiang Kai-shek's ruling area and fought to the door of Chiang Kai-shek's house.
Liu Deng decided to cross the river on the night of June 30.
Liu Bocheng chose the 300-mile-wide front from Puyang County to Dong'e as the river crossing section. Both sides of that area were old base areas, and the ships had been secretly prepared long ago, and the large ones could carry two ten-wheeled trucks, and the small ones could carry thirty or fifty people. That section of the Yellow River is 500 to 100 meters wide, and the water depth is one and a half feet.
In addition, Liu Bocheng adopted the style of fighting with the east and the west, and the main battle was coordinated.
The "support for combat" is similar to what was said in ancient times as "suspicious soldiers". He concealed the river-crossing army in northern Henan and set up suspicious troops in two directions to divert the attention of Chiang's army. The suspicious soldiers along the way were troops from the two military regions of Taihang and Southern Hebei, which launched an offensive in northern Henan. Another suspicious line is the attack of the troops of the Henan-Anhui Soviet Military Region to the area south of Kaifeng.
These two suspicious soldiers really worked. Especially along the road in northern Henan, the local troops disguised Liu Deng's main force and mobilized the Jiang army and Wang Zhonglian's troops. Wang Zhonglian was originally in the vicinity of Liu Deng's army, but on June 24, Chiang Kai-shek ordered them to march from Huaxian to Anyang in the north, farther away from the crossing of Liu Deng's main force.
Just when the suspicious soldiers on the two roads were making great fanfare and taking active action, on the evening of June 30, Liu Deng's army marched long and fast, unknowingly, from northern Henan to the southwest of Shandong to cross the river, and crossed the river on a section of 300 miles.
Liu Bocheng also used the tactics of combining smuggling and forcible crossing to order the 1st Independent Brigade of the Hebei-Shandong-Henan Military Region to smuggle in, and the 2nd Brigade was originally on the south bank. The vanguard of the main force, with the support of these two separate brigades, reached the south bank in only five minutes. At this time, gunfire rang out on the south bank, and artillery fire rang out on the north bank, blasting the eight ferries on the south bank into a sea of fire. At 12 o'clock in the night, eight ferries in 300 miles departed at the same time. In one night, six brigades were crossed.
Chiang's army and river defenses collapsed on all fronts at once. Mi Wenhe, the brigade commander of the first line of river defense (55th Brigade of the 181st Division), abandoned Juancheng and fled to Heze in the starry night. The deputy division commander led another unit guarding the river defense to flee to Yuncheng. Incredibly, Liu Ruzhen, the commander of another division (the 68th Division) that served as the river defense, did not know that the PLA had crossed the river by July 1.
Liu Deng's army successfully crossed the Yellow River and broke Chiang Kai-shek's "dumbbell array" at once. Chiang Kai-shek's myth of 400,000 troops disappeared overnight.
Chen Guanren, the secretary of the CPC History Publishing House's "Ten Marshals of the Chinese People's Liberation Army: The Little-Known History of the Ten Commanders of the People's Liberation Army," recounted the incident. The book is the annual bestseller of the society, which truthfully and objectively describes the conquest and character characteristics of the ten marshals, and is deeply respected by readers for its novel historical materials and accurate views, and has once ranked first on the best-selling list of China's military bestsellers (pictured).