In his later years, Hu Lian went to visit his friend Guan Linzheng, who settled in Hong Kong. The two talked about some things about the civil war between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party, and Hu Lian asked Guan Linzheng: "If it was not Du Yuming who was sent to the Northeast at that time, but you, what way would you have to deal with the PLA." ”
Guan Linzheng replied: "It's very simple, choose a general who is good at fighting, appoint him as the commander of the corps, and give him the heavy responsibility of commanding three elite armies, and clarify his mission to 'capture Lin Biao alive'." In terms of strategy, attacking cities and grabbing land is not the primary goal, but through flexible maneuvering, avoiding the real and attacking the weak, in order to enhance one's own strength and weaken the enemy's vital forces as the primary task. At the same time, the 200,000 puppet army of the puppet state of Manchukuo needed to be reorganized into a security force responsible for guarding the city. In this way, the main force could go into battle lightly and pursue Lin Biao with all their might, giving him constant pressure and never giving him any respite and regrouping. Lin Biao's foothold in the northeast will be completely destroyed, and he will eventually fall into a desperate situation, and a fiasco is inevitable. ”
So, if Guan Linzheng was asked to go to the Northeast as a security commander at that time, would his record really be better than Du Yuming's?
Don't deal with fellows
Guan Linzheng, a native of Huxian County, Shaanxi, was born in 1905, and he and Du Yuming were both born in Huangpu from Shaanxi. It stands to reason that when the fellow sees the fellow, the two eyes are full of tears, and they should support each other, but the two have never dealt with each other.
In the military academy, Guan Linzheng has excellent grades, but he has a lonely personality and is a bit unpopular, except for Huang Jie and fellow countryman Zhang Yaoming, who are good friends with him, almost no one can deal with him.
Du Yuming's personality is just the opposite of Guan Linzheng, he is more introverted, does not talk much, and his grades are not outstanding in the military academy, which is also destined to have different development trajectories between the two.
In 1928, Guan Linzheng was promoted to the commander of the 61st Regiment of the 11th Division (later promoted to the commander of the 32nd Brigade), which was not a central military system, but was adapted from the 17th Army of the Fujian warlord Zhou Yinren, with Cao Wanshun as the division commander and Chen Cheng as the deputy division commander.
Cao Wanshun is a sensible person, he is not a descendant, even if he knew that Chen Cheng was making small moves in the 11th Division, he was helpless, and was finally squeezed out, Chen Cheng took over as the division commander, and all the officers up and down the 11th Division were replaced by the Whampoa department.
Guan Linzheng, who had an upright personality, scoffed at Chen Cheng's practice, and he once said to Luo Zhuoying, chief of staff of the 11th Division, who came to woo him: "In my opinion, Chen Xiaozi is not better than Cao Wanshun, or even worse. ”
This sentence reached Chen Cheng's ears word for word, and Chen Cheng naturally would not give Guan Lin good fruit to eat, and finally Mingsheng secretly squeezed him out of the 11th division.
Guan Linzheng turned to He Yingqin and became a grudge with Chen Cheng.
After leaving the 11th Division, Guan Linzheng was promoted to the deputy commander of the newly formed Fifth Division. The newly formed Fifth Division was reorganized from the old unit of the former Shaanxi warlord Li Jicai, and military discipline was disbanded, and there were many veterans, and Guan Linzheng was squeezed out everywhere after taking office, and it was impossible to carry out its work at all.
In a fit of rage, Guan Linzheng left the newly formed Fifth Division and became the second instructor of the Central Committee in Zhang Zhizhong, serving as the commander of the 1st Regiment of the 1st Brigade.
During the Central Plains War in 1930, Guan Linzheng was promoted to the commander of the 2nd Brigade of the 2nd Central Committee for his meritorious service to protect Chiang, and was reappointed as the commander of the 11th Brigade of the 4th Division the following year.
In 1932, Guan Linzheng led his troops to fight against the Red Fourth Front Army in Hubei, Henan and Anhui, and was promoted to the commander of the 25th Division of the 17th Army for his military exploits. The 25th Division is under the jurisdiction of Du Yuming's 73rd Brigade and Zhang Yaoming's 75th Brigade.
However, Guan Linzheng values Zhang Yaoming more, and the two have had a personal relationship since they were in military school. As for Du Yuming, Guan Linzheng is not cold.
Xu Tingyao, the commander of the 17th Army, admired Du Yuming more and intended to promote him to the deputy commander of the 25th Division, but Guan Linzheng strongly recommended his henchman Zhang Yaoming.
After Du Yuming was promoted to deputy commander of the 25th Division, Guan Linzheng was greatly annoyed and worked against Du Yuming everywhere.
Du Yuming was good at training soldiers, and did everything himself, stipulating that soldiers train for 4 hours a day, and Guan Linzheng changed it to 2 hours in the name of division commander; Du Yuming asked the soldiers to run 10 kilometers during training, and Guan Linzheng changed it to 5 kilometers. All Du Yuming's propositions must be changed when Guan Linzheng arrives. After coming and going, Du Yuming was set up, no one listened to him, and the situation of the 25th master was quite embarrassing.
After the outbreak of the Great Wall War of Resistance in 1933, the 17th Army was ordered to go north to participate in the war, and Guan Linzheng led the 25th Division as the vanguard to occupy Gubeikou.
In the firefight with the Japanese army, Guan Linzheng was unfortunately injured by a grenade and was wounded in five places, and the 25th Division was handed over to the command of Deputy Division Commander Du Yuming.
After the end of the Great Wall Anti-Japanese War, the division commander Guan Linzheng and the commander of the 75th Brigade Zhang Yaoming were both awarded the "Blue Sky and White Sun Medal", but Du Yuming, the deputy division commander who commanded on behalf of him, received nothing.
This result made Du Yuming disheartened, and he was squeezed out by Guan Lin everywhere in the 25th Division, so Du Yuming had no choice but to complain to the army commander Xu Tingyao. Through his connections, Xu Tingyao sponsored Du Yuming to enter the first phase of the higher education class offered by the Nanjing Central Military Academy, and never returned to the 25th Division after that.
After the outbreak of the all-out Anti-Japanese War, Guan Linzheng was already the commander of the 52nd Army, while Du Yuming was promoted by the old commander Xu Tingyao to serve as the commander of the Major General of the Armored Corps, which laid a solid foundation for him to later become the commander of the Mechanized Fifth Army.
After the Battle of Taierzhuang, Guan Linzheng was promoted to the commander of the 32nd Army Corps for his military exploits, and the post of commander of the 52nd Army was taken over by his henchman Zhang Yaoming.
Originally, the commander of the 52nd Army was supposed to be succeeded by Zheng Dongguo, commander of the 2nd Division. Although Zhang Yaoming and Zheng Dongguo are both in the first phase of Whampoa, Zheng Dongguo served as the division commander a year earlier than him, and Zheng Dongguo is also stronger than Zhang Yaoming in terms of ability and combat performance.
However, Guan Linzheng was more partial to the township party, he had a very close personal relationship with Zhang Yaoming, and it was impossible for him to hand over his descendants to an outsider to lead, so through his relationship, Zhang Yaoming successfully took over as the commander of the 52nd Army, Zheng Dongguo was only the deputy commander, and he did not even serve as the commander of the 2nd Division.
As a result, Zheng Dongguo was completely hollowed out in the 52nd Army, had no real power, and went to seek refuge with his old classmate Du Yuming under the grievances.
In October 1939, Guan Linzheng was promoted to commander-in-chief of the 15th Group Army due to his performance in the First Battle of Changsha, becoming the second Huangpu student to serve as the commander-in-chief of the group army after Hu Zongnan, a protégé of the "Son of Heaven".
After the Japanese army occupied Vietnam, it approached Guidian, Guan Linzheng led the 15th Group Army (soon renamed the 9th Group Army) to defend southern Yunnan, and Huang Wei's 54th Army, which was subordinate to the Civil Engineering Department, was transferred to the 9th Group Army.
Huang Wei also graduated from the first phase of Huangpu, and had a certain friendship with Guan Linzheng when he served in the 11th Division, but after each thing went its own way, the friendship between the two collapsed and formed a hostile relationship.
Soon, Huang Wei sent a bag of moldy military rations mixed with sand and gravel directly to the Chongqing Military and Political Department, accusing the military station of embezzling military rations. He Yingqin was furious and accused Huang Wei of sabotaging the independence of military supplies and increasing supplies to the troops without authorization, so Huang Wei was transferred from the 54th Army.
Guan Linzheng wanted to take the opportunity to annex the 54th Army, after all, this was Chen Cheng's army, so he sent his cronie Zhang Yaoming to take over as the commander of the 54th Army, but the officers and soldiers of the 54th Army were opposed, Zhang Yaoming did not dare to go to take office, and Guan Linzheng's plan fell through.
After the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, Xiong Shihui was appointed as the director of the Northeast Xingyuan, and Jiang also set up a special Northeast Security Command, preparing to send a capable general to take charge of the military. It is said that the initial candidate was Guan Linzheng, but when the appointment was announced, it was replaced by Du Yuming.
Because, at this time, He Yingqin had already lost power, but Chen Cheng, who was in the same power as Guan Linzheng, naturally would not give Guan Linzheng a good opportunity to show his skills, Guan Linzheng sat on the cold bench, and was later sent to serve as the principal of the Army Military Academy.
At the beginning, the Northeast Security Command only had the 13th Army (Army Commander Shi Jue) and the 52nd Army (Army Commander Zhao Gongwu), and later transferred to the New First Army (Army Commander Sun Liren), the New Sixth Army (Army Commander Liao Yaoxiang), the 71st Army (Army Commander Chen Mingren), the 60th Army (Army Commander Zeng Zesheng) and the 93rd Army (Army Commander Lu Junquan), and the strength was still quite strong.
During his stay in the Northeast, the people who had the greatest opinions on Du Yuming were Sun Liren, the commander of the New First Army, and Shi Jue, the commander of the 13th Army.
Sun Liren and Du Yuming had worked together when they were in the expeditionary force, and the cooperation between the two sides was not pleasant, especially after the defeat of Savage Mountain, which deepened the contradiction between the two.
Sun Liren was a student in the United States, and Du Yuming graduated from the first phase of Huangpu, which also led to the difference in military thinking between the two. In terms of tactics, the two also had disagreements many times, and Sun Liren thought in his later memories that Du Yuming was too conservative in combat.
Shi Jue, the commander of the 13th Army, is Tang Enbo's descendant, and his evaluation of Du Yuming is even more polite, and he frankly said that Du Yuming is a division commander, of course, this sentence is a bit hurtful, no matter how bad Du Yuming is, he is stronger than Shi Jue.
It is difficult to compare the military talents of Du Yuming and Guan Linzheng. However, Du Yuming has an advantage, he is better at handling interpersonal relationships, but even so, there are often situations where the command is not smooth, in addition to Zeng Zesheng and Lu Junquan in the Yunnan army system, the most headache for him is Sun Liren and Shi Jue.
Guan Linzheng's military talent is not to be mentioned, and he can be regarded as the best among the Whampoa students, but he handles interpersonal relationships too badly, and his arrogant personality makes it difficult for him to go to the northeast, except for his old army 52nd Army, and other army commanders will definitely not have a good relationship, so don't talk about the next command work.
Therefore, if it was not Du Yuming who was sent to the Northeast at that time, but Guan Linzheng, the effect would not necessarily be better than Du Yuming, and it might have been defeated faster.