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Text: Xiaomo
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introduction
The Huaihai Campaign is one of the classic cases in the history of our party in which we won more with less, and after this battle, the strength of our army and the Kuomintang army was fundamentally reversed.
Deng Xiaoping once commented: Once the Huaihai Campaign is over, there will be no major battles in the future.
Before the war, Chiang Kai-shek thought it was a war of annihilation. He never understood why his Kuomintang elite was wiped out in the Battle of Huaihai.
After retreating to Taiwan, the top level of the Kuomintang made many post-war summaries. And if Chiang Kai-shek had known that the People's Liberation Army had 600,000 troops, would he still insist on the Huaihai War?
(Group photo of the commander-in-chief of the Huaihai Campaign)
1. Before the Huaihai Campaign: Our army has the right time and place, and the sword is aimed at the Central Plains
The year came to 1948, two years after Chiang Kai-shek tore up the armistice agreement and brazenly launched a civil war.
Back in 1946, when the artillery of the Nationalist army attacked the liberated areas, Chiang Kai-shek said that he would cut through the chaos quickly. However, only two years later, our army has taken advantage of the time, place and people, and took the lead in getting the match point.
In the first year of the War of Liberation, our army resisted the attack of the Kuomintang army in the liberated areas, and after more than 200 major battles, it annihilated 1.12 million Kuomintang troops, dealt a heavy blow to the invincible Kuomintang, and gradually grasped the initiative in the war.
In the second year, our army adjusted its strategy, changed the internal line operation to the external line operation, and resolved to move to the rear of the Kuomintang-ruled area, deal a heavy blow to it, and smash the Yellow Dragon directly.
In two years, the People's Liberation Army (PLA) has shifted from the stage of strategic defense and stalemate mentioned in "On Protracted War" to the stage of strategic offensive.
(Chairman Mao's "On Protracted War")
On June 30, 1948, the Central Plains Field Army led by Liu Bocheng and Deng Xiaoping launched the Southwest Lu Campaign.
Liu Deng's army crossed the Yellow River to the south, leaped thousands of miles into the Dabie Mountains, and formed a coordinated combat posture with the East China Field Army in the Henan-Anhui region, and successfully advanced the front to the Yangtze River region.
This action posed a serious threat to the Jiangnan region around Wuhan and Nanjing, the stronghold of the Kuomintang, and forced Chiang Kai-shek to transfer heavy troops to the Xuzhou area to deal with the pressure of the large army of our Central Plains and East China Field Army.
(Liu Deng's army marched into Dabie Mountain)
Before the Battle of Huaihai, China had taken on a very different face under the leadership of two parties.
Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalist Government ruled areas with inflation and economic collapse, while the liberated areas ruled by our army were carrying out vigorous land reforms, distributing land to the peasants, so that the cultivators could have their own land, and were loved by the masses.
During the War of Liberation, a large number of peasants who had obtained land supported the front line, providing food and materials for the PLA.
It can be said that at this time, our party has already taken the lead and has come to the stage of strategic decisive battle, and the battle for the Central Plains is just around the corner. At this time, Chiang Kai-shek was still with his Kuomintang army, dreaming of the Spring and Autumn period of dictatorship.
(The People's Liberation Army divides land for peasants in liberated areas)
2. Chiang Kai-shek's Kuomintang: Underestimate the enemy in battle, and do not know the true strength of the PLA
For a long time, the National Revolutionary Army was the most powerful army on the mainland. As the only legitimate army representing China, they bravely killed the enemy on the frontal battlefield of resistance against Japan and dealt a severe blow to the Japanese army.
After the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, until 1948, the Kuomintang generals at all levels, represented by Chiang Kai-shek, still regarded the People's Liberation Army as "communist bandits", believing that they were irregular and that the victory was purely a fluke.
This contempt is not unfounded.
Most of the senior generals of the national army were born in the Whampoa Military Academy, and later went to Germany and the United States for further study, learning the most advanced leading knowledge in the world at that time. Most of the weapons and equipment of the national army were provided by the United States, which was the most advanced armament in the world at that time.
(All-American equipment of the national army)
In the comparison of the military strength of the Kuomintang and the Communist Party, the Kuomintang showed a crushing trend. At that time, the national army was fighting against more than 1 million people of our People's Liberation Army, and the disparity of 4:1 was unthinkable.
It is not difficult to imagine that in 1947, when Hu Zongnan's army entered Yan'an, surrounded an empty city, and was overjoyed to announce a great victory, inviting Chiang Kai-shek to come and inspect the results of the battle, the Kuomintang shouted the slogan of defeating the communist army in three months, which may have been Chiang Kai-shek's heartfelt words.
It's just that in the subsequent Menglianggu Battle and Jinan Campaign, the 74th Division of the Kuomintang Army's trump card, the "Imperial Forest Army", was completely annihilated, and the Kuomintang was in an uproar.
(Chairman Mao evacuated Yan'an ahead of schedule)
It can be seen that as far as the Kuomintang is concerned, they have always lacked an in-depth understanding of our party's strength and operational policy.
At this time, it has been ten years since Chairman Mao's military work "On Poetry and Long War", and the national army is still dealing with the People's Liberation Army with the so-called "regular army" of Germany and the United States.
Before the Huaihai Campaign, the 800,000 elite troops of the Kuomintang gathered in Xuzhou, forming several elite corps headed by Huang Baitao, Huang Wei, Qiu Qingquan and Du Yuming.
Chiang Kai-shek could never have imagined that in a short period of time, our Huaye and Central Plains field armies would be able to gather 600,000 troops in Xuzhou and fight a decisive battle with them.
As a matter of fact, the transformation of the Xiaohuaihai Campaign into a strategic decisive battle was also decided by General Su Yu and Chairman Mao after repeated discussions and studies.
Although our army was sure that "the superiority lies in us" in this battle, we did not expect that the elite division of the Kuomintang, known as the "million-strong division," would be defeated one by one in a short period of time, and the defeated prisoners and prisoners would not be able to form an army.
Once upon a time, Qiu Qingquan, a lieutenant general of the Kuomintang Army, wrote a poem: "The king has never been owned by the Han Dynasty, how can the country be separated from the thieves." In his heart, Chiang Kai-shek and his own Kuomintang army were the "Han" and should enjoy the royal industry.
And the Kuomintang underestimated the enemy, and finally in the form of a boomerang, nailed the national army to defeat.
3. Chiang Kai-shek: If we can do it all over again, this battle will not be fought
This battle, which began on November 6, 1948 and lasted two months, ended with the annihilation and capture of 550,000 Chinese troops and the defeat of the national army.
At this point, all the elite of the Kuomintang was wiped out, and it was no longer possible to organize forces to contend with our army. The victory in the Huaihai Campaign was not only a victory for our party and our army, but also a victory for the 5.43 million front-line supporters and a victory for the people.
On the other side, Chiang Kai-shek saw the defeat of the Nationalist army, the loss of armor, and he knew that he had no hope of victory. In January 1949, on the occasion of the victory of the Huaihai Campaign, Chiang Kai-shek issued a proclamation, saying that he hoped to conduct peace negotiations with the CCP, implying the intention of going into the wilderness.
It's just that Chiang Kai-shek at this time has lost his right to speak. On the same day, Chairman Mao published an article in the People's Daily entitled "Carry the Revolution to the End", which completely punctured Chiang Kai-shek's fantasy bubble.
(Chairman Mao, "Carry the Revolution to the End")
After the defeat of the Nationalist army, many high-ranking Kuomintang generals summed up the defeat.
Du Yuming recalled during the transformation of Gongdelin that he suggested that Chiang Kai-shek implement the "Xu Beng Battle Plan", and Chiang Kai-shek resolutely implemented the policy of "defending the river must defend Huai", and he felt that the defeated army was in appearance.
Chiang Kai-shek himself must have regretted the defeat in the Huaihai Campaign, and he pondered and hesitated repeatedly, and changed the tactics and strategies of the Xuzhou battlefield three times a day, and hundreds of thousands of troops were like headless flies on the battlefield.
It can be met that if Chiang Kai-shek had known the strength of our army before the war and seriously analyzed the battlefield situation, he would not have deployed hundreds of thousands of troops to fight the Huaihai Campaign with our army, which had the advantage of time, place, and people.
It's just that war is like this, it affects the whole body, and the change of timing is like a grass snake gray line, and once the defeat is doomed, it can no longer be reversed.
Resources:
Yu Huiduo, Wang Qian.Huaihai Campaign——Pre-war Planning and Layout of the Kuomintang and the Communist Party[J].Wenshi Chunqiu,2023,(07):35-38.
Chen Qi.《Huaihai War》[J].Military History,2023,92(11):79.)