This happened in 1979, Su Yu wrote his memoirs, and Wang Xixian helped him write them. Wang Xixian said that in an article recalling the Battle of Eastern Henan, Su Yu put forward the theory that Huaye had six main columns.
Why rare? Su Yu is kind and kind, and never deliberately engages in estrangement and distance. The ranking of combat effectiveness has a great impact on the prestige of the column commanders, and even has an impact on the military status after liberation.
The six first-class main columns were: the first column, the third column, the fourth column, the eighth column, the ninth column, and the tenth column. The selection of the six main forces is a very controversial topic for folk martial arts lovers. But because the ranker is Su Yu, with the prestige of his old man, he naturally does not dare to be disputed. We have to admit that this is the real combat effectiveness ranking of more than a dozen main columns in Huaye.
Which column is the most lost? It is undoubtedly the famous Wang Tiger Column: Huaye Six Columns.
This seems to be inconsistent with the folk cognition, King Ye Tao and 146 have always been known in the world, and all four are there, why did Six lose the election?
First, is it to take care of face
General Su personally ranked, of course, we have to recognize, although there is no controversy, but we can also get a glimpse of some interesting details from the ranking. For example, there is no face-taking component.
In 1979, 30 years had passed since the Huaye Column was abolished, and the commanders and political commissars of the column had all taken up very high leadership positions, and some even came from behind to sit on an equal footing with Su Yu. Could such a rare column ranking, which is easy to cause discussion, be affected by the status of the column commanders? That's where it's interesting to delve into the secrets of history.
Let's take a general look at the positions and ranks of the column commanders in 1979.
Ye Fei, commander and political commissar of the First Column, was reappointed as political commissar of the Navy in 1979 from the Minister of Communications of the State Council.
Sun Jixian, commander of the Third Column, was a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference in 1979, and previously served as deputy commander and adviser of the Jinan Military Region. Some people say that the first commander He Yixiang and He have a lower rank than Sun Jixian, which is a special case for the commanders of the columns, so Sun Jixian is the representative of the three columns.
Tao Yong, the commander of the Fourth Column, died (1967).
Wang Jian'an, commander of the Eighth Column, was appointed as a member of the Standing Committee of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection in 1979.
Xu Shiyou, commander of the Ninth Column, was transferred from Nanjing to the Guangzhou Military Region as commander in 1973, and commanded the border war in Guangzhou in 1979.
Song Shilun, commander of the 10th Column, was the president of the Academy of Military Sciences in 1979, and was also a member of the Central Committee of the Party and the Central Military Commission. Su Yu's positions at that time were: member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, member of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, member of the Standing Committee of the Central Military Commission, and first political commissar of the Academy of Military Sciences. Song Su is the partner of the military department, and to a certain extent, it can be regarded as an equal to Su Yu.
The six first-class main forces, the combat effectiveness of the ten columns is actually slightly weaker.
Su Yu also said in his evaluation that the 1st and 4th columns are good at field warfare, the 3rd, 8th, and 9th columns are good at attacking fortified positions, and the 10th column is slightly weaker.
However, Su Yu also said that the basis of the first-class main force is not simply the number of troops and the results of the battle, but "measured by the role it plays in the victory of the campaign." ”
When the 10th Column was formed, there were only two divisions, and the other columns were all three divisions, which were weak. However, the willpower of the Ten Vertical Fighting Resistance War is extremely strong, and it is also very methodical. This was the case with the Eastern Henan Campaign against Qiu Qingquan's corps at Taolin Gang, and the same was true of the Xudong Resistance Battle in the Huaihai Campaign.
There are many columns that attack fortifications and have strong mobility capabilities, but the 10th column is the only one that fights the blocking war to this extent.
It is impossible to say that there is no favor at all in the evaluation of the Ten Verticals, but this component is not very big, and the important thing is to look at the level of combat effectiveness.
If you want to take care of face, General Wei Guoqing, the commander of the second column and political commissar, had a higher power and status than Song Shilun in 1979. At that time, General Wei was director of the General Political Department, member of the Standing Committee of the Central Military Commission, deputy secretary general of the Central Military Commission, member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, vice chairman of the National People's Congress, and vice chairman of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference. However, the combat effectiveness of the Second Column was really not good back then, and Su Yu did not go against the actual situation and rated the Second Column as the first-class main force.
Second, who is the most pity of the six main commanders
General Su Yu said that the strength of the six main forces was comparable, and said that the ten columns were slightly weaker. In fact, there are also some comparisons implied, and columns and columns cannot be completely the same in strength.
For example, when our army evaluates the five main forces of the Kuomintang army, there will also be a distinction between superior and inferior. Generally speaking, it is believed that the 74th Division is the strongest, and the second tier is the Fifth Army and the Eighteenth Army, which is Su Yu's evaluation. The New First Army and the New Sixth Army, Su Yu has no contact and no evaluation. However, judging from the actual situation, the New Sixth Army in the Northeast period seems to be slightly stronger than the New First Army.
In this section, we will not talk about the ten verticals, Su Yu has given a clear comparison.
What are the strength characteristics of the other five columns? Who does Su Yu like the most?
The author does not take the liberty of saying that it is probably one or four verticals.
Do the elimination method first. The first to be excluded is the Nine Verticals. The characteristics of the Ninth Vertical are relatively distinct, and the two commanders, Xu Shiyou and Nie Fengzhi, are both outstanding among the people, and they are very powerful in commanding operations, and they have their own characteristics.
Su Yu commented that the third, eighth, and ninth columns were all good at attacking fortified positions, but did not say whether they were good at mobile field warfare. The senior leaders of the country at their level did not say that they were basically not strong. The incident of smashing the phone is a direct example, and Commander Xu did not understand the significance of maneuvering to lure the enemy. At the end of the Eastern Henan Campaign, he refused to transfer south to fight Xuzhou, which is also the same reason. Attacking and fighting to the death, this is Commander Xu's strength, and it is also a comfort zone, and he can't get out of it.
In the previous article, we analyzed the situation of the chiefs of staff of the various columns in Huaye, the situation of the Ninth Column is relatively special, when Xu Shiyou was the commander, Nie Fengzhi was the chief of staff, but only for 4 months, after Nie Fengzhi was promoted to the commander, the Ninth Column was no longer equipped with a chief of staff, not even a deputy commander. The more logistical the war of liberation became, the more prominent the role of the chief of staff became. What's the law behind it?
The services and arms are becoming more and more sophisticated, coordination of various tactics is more important, operational command is moving closer and closer to the international community, and individual commanders are being changed from individual commanders to team commands, so that the response is more accurate, the judgment of the situation is more correct, the command of operations and peacetime training can be more organically integrated, and the coordination of multiple arms can be done better, and the era of having one commander as the core is slowly passing away.
The tide of military modernization and regularization is irresistible, and this is reflected in the personnel relations of the troops, that is, the chief of staff is becoming more and more important.
Su Yu himself saw it very clearly, and he constantly promoted Zhang Zhen, who had the talent of chief of staff, and built the Huaye Command into a real operational command organization rather than a big steward. However, he did not exert a lot of effort to promote the regularization of various columns, and only made some adjustments to some key columns and columns that were good at promoting work, and the third, eighth, and ninth columns of the Shandong Eighth Route Army did not use any knives. The Ninth Column does not have a chief of staff, and it is not even willing to cope with the work on the surface.
So to talk about exclusion, let's put the nine verticals first.
The characteristics of the eight verticals are not very obvious, and the ability to attack fortifications and the three verticals are probably a horizontal plane. The outstanding feature of the Eight Verticals is arrogance, Commander Xu is selectively arrogant, he will not ignore it, the respect that should be given must be given, as long as Chen Yi speaks, Commander Xu is a hundred convinced. Wang Jian'an was slightly different, the Lunan Campaign was fighting Zaozhuang in a hurry, and Wang Jian'an said that he would transfer the troops of the Luzhong Military Region (the predecessor of the Eighth Column) away, and he didn't even say a word, and he didn't take the front finger in his eyes.
The three verticals have undergone a major change of chief officials, and Sun Jixian is a junior in front of Xu and Wang, and he has no proud capital in front of Su Yu. Whether it is cleaned up or valued, it is not the turn of the three verticals, so let's not talk about it.
A vertical Ye Fei is relatively the most perfect one, Ye Tao Wang three tiger generals, only Ye Fei became the commander of the corps in February 1949, 55 awarded the title of general, although there is a defeat in Kinmen, it did not affect the position after the founding of the People's Republic of China all the way up, the ending is quite satisfying.
The most regrettable thing is the four vertical Tao Yong.
On the one hand, the ending is not good, and he died prematurely. Huaye's column commanders have their own personalities, Tao Yong and Wang Jian'an are the more irritable, but Wang Jian'an is constantly beaten, and Mr. Chen and the chairman have reminded them to varying degrees, and later Wang Jian's arrogance has been much more restrained. There was no life-threatening situation for a period of 10 years.
Tao Yong has a strong personality and has always been blessed by Su Yu, but he has suffered little in this regard, and he does not know how to compromise with the things that are difficult to compromise in the world, and finally caused a tragedy in his life, which is extremely regrettable.
On the other hand, there was no military outbreak.
The commander of the column had two chances to break through. One time was in February 1949, when Huaye was reorganized into Sanye, and he seized that opportunity to take the position of commander of the corps, and in 1955, he was the rank of general of Tieda. It's a pity that Tao Yong missed a great opportunity, Ye Tao Wang is a big general, only Ye Fei is among the commanders of the four major corps, part of the reason is indeed that Tao and Wang are less qualified, and they can't compare to Chen Shiyu, Wang Jian'an and Song Shilun, and the other part is that Su Yu is too humble and unwilling to promote too many generals from the New Fourth Army in Central China to high positions?
Another opportunity was to resist US aggression and aid Korea. If he plays well and performs well, Tao Yong may also be like Han Xianchu and will be further promoted by the deputy commander of the corps. It's a pity that on the one hand, Tao Yong has absolute respect for Song Shilun, and will not dare to raise objections to Deng Hua like Commander Whirlwind, nor has he won too many opportunities to command the campaign independently. Although there was also a record of leading the team to annihilate the polar bear regiment, the movement was not very big in the end, and the last opportunity was not seized.
The 1952 position is an important reference for the 55-year evaluation, Tao Yong was appointed commander of the East China Military Region Navy in November 1952, and if it is put to the present, his position is no less than that of the corps commander. It's a pity that the army was still the main force at that time, and Tao Yong missed the last bit of fire, and the medal was fixed at the deputy corps level.
Three, six vertical and two ends of the point
The Sixth Column has the most star temperament in the Huaye columns, and the grievances with the reorganization of the 74th Division, Lianshui suffered a big loss, and Meng Lianggu had to take revenge and kill the enemy division commander, which is quite legendary.
It is precisely because of this star temperament that its combat effectiveness level has been exaggerated by the public.
Compared with the more comprehensive capabilities of the first vertical and four verticals, the six verticals actually have many shortcomings. Let's try to list a few as follows:
1. The ability to take charge alone is not strong. In July, the first and fourth columns were divided out of Lunan, and the sixth column was always left by Su Yu. Young sons have always kept the stove, why? The youngest son is not as capable as the eldest son, the simplest truth.
2. Lack of a kick at the critical moment. In the battle of Laiwu, the six columns received the heavy responsibility and besieged Kouzhen. This is the bottom of Su Yu's pocket array, which is responsible for the important task of encircling all the Kuomintang troops. However, the Sixth Column was unable to capture it for a long time, and only one regiment of the enemy was stationed in the town, and it was a second-rate commodity. Who? There are serious shortcomings in attacking fortifications and blasting capabilities, and even Piding, who came from the Central Plains and is known for his poor equipment, can't stand it.
3. Commander's adaptability. Wang Laohu is worthy of his name, and he is a proper tiger general. In terms of personal courage alone, General Wang Bicheng is not inferior to anyone in Huaye, so Tao Yong can compete with him. However, when it comes to the position of column commander, the ability requirements are higher, not only requiring not being afraid of death, daring to fight, but also requiring calmness and wisdom, and being good at using brains.
Later, in 79, there was an incident on the border, and Wang Bicheng and Yang Dezhi were temporarily reversed, and Yang and Xu were released on the east and west lines. It can be seen that the general is in battle, and it is more important to stabilize the morale of the army than to be brave and good at fighting.
Although Song Shilun committed a lot of battles of will, he still let him command an attack group and take on the responsibility of the front when he attacked Jinan. Entering the dynasty also let him lead the team independently and command a large corps. There may be shortcomings in personality, and it should not be a big problem to deal with big scenes in terms of ability.
Judging from all aspects of the situation, General Su's judgment of the six main forces may have a little bit of emotional consideration, but there is no need to doubt the objectivity and accuracy.