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Wen Shiya
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introduction
Speaking of the War of Liberation, everyone will naturally mention the Liaoshen Campaign, the Huaihai Campaign, and the Pingjin Campaign......
The large-scale combat operations from 1946 until June 1950 to liberate Hainan Island basically ended, which was a highlight moment in Chinese history.
And there is one liberation battle that seems obscure in this history and is rarely mentioned, and it is the Battle of Dengbu Island.
(Landing Operations)
In the Battle of Dengbu Island, our army fought with 2 regiments against 6 regiments of the Kuomintang, killing and wounding nearly 4,000 enemies, but the PLA finally took the initiative to retreat and ended in failure.
Although the Battle of Dengbu Island failed to achieve the goal of seizing the island, was the Battle of Dengbu Island really a failure?
(Landing Operations)
1. "There is Dengbu in the north, and there is Jinmen in the south", a distorted history
Those who have studied Taiwan's historical materials will find a very interesting phenomenon: the propaganda and historical materials of the Taiwan authorities have very few descriptions of the famous liberation battles mentioned at the beginning, on the contrary, the battle of Kinmen and the battle of Dengbu Island, which is not well known to everyone.
In the mouth of the Taiwan authorities, the Battle of Dengbu Island, like the Battle of Kinmen, was an outright major defeat for the PLA.
"There is Dengbu in the north and Kinmen in the south." The Taiwan authorities believe that it was precisely these two defeats of the PLA that kept Taiwan from falling into the hands of the PLA.
But what is the truth of history?
(Landing Operations)
Was the Battle of Dengbu Island really a complete defeat?
Before the Battle of Dengbu Island, the People's Liberation Army (PLA) had achieved good results on the Zhoushan battlefield, and the Liuheng, Shrimp and Peach Blossom Islands were taken one after another.
In order to liberate Zhoushan Island as soon as possible, the 7th Corps immediately ordered the 61st Division to launch a battle to capture Dengbu Island on November 3 after liberating Taohua Island.
After receiving the order, the 61st Division reported to its superiors that some of its ships had been blown up by enemy planes and that they were running out of supplies, and that it would face certain difficulties in immediately capturing Dengbu Island, and hoped that the superiors would give them a certain amount of time to make more adequate preparations.
However, on October 1, 1949, when Chairman Mao solemnly announced the founding of the People's Republic of China at Tiananmen Square, commanders and soldiers at all levels were eager to try this exciting news, hoping to send a congratulatory gift to the motherland with the victory of the battle.
(Chairman Mao announced the founding of the People's Republic of China at the Tiananmen Tower)
Therefore, after receiving the report of the difficulties of the 61st Division, the higher authorities decided to set aside a mountain artillery battalion to support it, and allocated an additional 600 life-saving equipment to the 61st Division to overcome the difficulties, and ordered it to continue to quickly capture Dengbu Island according to the scheduled time.
After receiving the order, Hu Wei, then commander of the 61st Division, began to formulate a plan for landing on the island, and even if there were difficulties, the orders of the superiors would definitely be resolutely implemented.
Second, brave and tenacious, but God is not beautiful
At 10 o'clock in the evening of November 3, more than 100 ships in the first echelon of the 61st Division set off as planned to attack Dengbu Island.
(PLA soldiers who landed on the island by boat)
When the first echelon marched to the front of the enemy's beachhead, it encountered fierce resistance, the weather was not beautiful, and the wind direction at this time also happened to be reversed, coupled with the lack of sailing experience of the People's Liberation Army, many ships lost their way during the voyage, and finally only two battalions and one company of fighters successfully landed, which led to the extremely limited number of troops of our army participating in the battle.
Due to the sudden reversal and change of wind direction, many ships and soldiers in the follow-up plan were also unable to successfully land on the island to support the follow-up operations.
But even in this case, more than 1,000 fighters who successfully landed still carried out a fierce attack as originally planned, and soon took three-quarters of the position on Dengbu Island.
(People's Liberation Army logged on Dengbu Island)
However, due to the fact that many of the originally planned troops failed to land on the island, the PLA forces were extremely limited, and the Kuomintang troops also resisted stubbornly and waited for support, and by the morning of November 4, the situation on Dengbu Island suddenly took a sharp turn.
3. Brutal tug-of-war
Dengbu Island is located in the southeast of Zhoushan Island, and the Kuomintang at that time believed that once Dengbu Island lost its sea transportation and supply line, it would cause great damage to the garrison work, so in the eyes of the Kuomintang, Dengbu Island was a place that must be defended.
(Location of Dengbu Island)
On the morning of November 4, the Kuomintang defenders on Dengbu Island received rapid support from the navy and air force, and then launched a frantic counterattack against our army.
Under the all-round ferocious and continuous counterattack of the Kuomintang army's sea, land and air, the 61st Division landed on the island at this time and suffered heavy casualties.
On the evening of November 4, Hu Wei, commander of the 61st Division, personally led part of the support forces to break through the Kuomintang resistance when the tide returned, and successfully landed on the island and joined the first echelon.
Hu Wei originally planned to divide his forces into two groups to capture the pier from the left and right directions, but the attack failed due to the disparity in strength between the enemy and us.
(Heroic PLA soldiers)
As of November 5, the PLA had landed a total of 2 regiments on the island, and at this time, the Kuomintang had deployed 6 regiments of troops to conduct sea, land and air operations and continued to be joined by reinforcements.
The desperate PLA troops fought tenaciously despite the lack of guns, ammunition, and food supplies, and constantly repelled the frantic counterattacks of the Kuomintang army. The entire Dengbu Island was filled with war, and gunfire rang out one after another.
Fourth, the dilemma, the final choice of "golden cicada shelling"
When the war was in a white-hot situation, Division Commander Hu Wei was in a dilemma.
At this time, although Hu Wei had just turned thirty years old, he had been on the battlefield for more than ten years, and with his rich combat experience, he knew very well that there was no possibility of winning in the current situation, and he could not continue to mobilize reinforcements from Peach Blossom Island, because this might increase the risk of defending Peach Blossom Island.
(Hu Wei, commander of the 61st Division)
But if the withdrawal of the army is ordered at this time, Hu Wei himself may be labeled as a "general of the defeated army", and it may become a hurdle in his heart that he cannot get over in his life.
In a dilemma, for the sake of the life and death of the soldiers and the minimization of the losses of the PLA, Hu Wei resolutely chose to "take the initiative to retreat".
Hu Wei knew that in the face of such a situation, it would be very difficult to withdraw from the island to fight, and the slightest mistake would risk the destruction of the whole division.
(Kuomintang warships participating in the war)
Hu Wei "inadvertently" leaked false news about the preparation of a night attack to the Kuomintang.
The Kuomintang was well aware that the People's Liberation Army (PLA) had always been good at night raids, and that the PLA had indeed acted immobile during the day, so it naturally believed this news.
(PLA fighters in action)
On the night of November 5, the trumpets of the charge on Dengbu Island were heard one after another, and the Kuomintang troops thought that the PLA was starting to attack, so they only fired wildly on their own, but the 61st Division had already evacuated by boat in an orderly and rapid manner in the feint.
By 1 a.m. on November 6, the 61st Division had all been safely evacuated, and the tragic Battle of Dengbu Island had come to an end.
In May 1950, our army launched another landing operation on the island, and the island was liberated on the same day, and the Zhoushan Islands were all liberated on the 19th
5. There are different opinions, did the Battle of Dengbu Island fail?
On June 20, 2018, General Hu Wei died of illness in Beijing, and when he was dying, he still remembered the comrades who died in the battle of Dengbu Island, and finally he chose to scatter his ashes in the sea area of Dengbu Island, which was his greatest wish - to be with his comrades forever.
(The scene of General Hu Wei's ashes scattered in the sea)
In the Battle of Dengbu Island, the 61st Division of the People's Liberation Army fought a bloody battle with the strength of 2 regiments and 6 regiments of the Kuomintang Army, and in the end, our army sacrificed more than 1,000 people, but the Kuomintang army paid the price of more than 4,000 casualties.
From the point of view of the target result, the battle of Dengbu Island may have been a failure, but from the perspective of the disparity in strength between the enemy and the enemy, and the comparison of casualties, the PLA troops not only made the other side pay a heavy price, but also managed to retreat with all their bodies, preserving their strength for another battle.
(Recorded in Hu Wei's memoir "Chronicle of the Journey")
Judging from the far-reaching impact on the Chinese Liberation War, after the Battle of Dengbu Island, the Central Military Commission began to pay great attention to the Dinghai operation, and Chairman Mao personally gave instructions - "You must pay serious attention to the troops, deployment, preparedness, and attack timing of the Dinghai operation."
items. "It has laid a solid foundation for the subsequent comprehensive liberation of the Zhoushan Islands.
Therefore, the Battle of Dengbu Island cannot be called a complete failure, and it may be more accurate to call it a "setback in the attack", and the valuable experience brought by the post-war review is even more precious.
(Dengbu Island Martyrs Cemetery)
Resources:
Lu Hui,Zheng Huaisheng.The process and thinking of the landing operation of Dengbu Island[J].Military History,2007,(03):21-25.
China Military Network: He scattered his ashes into the sea, following the track of his battle.China Military Network, 2019-06-06