In 1994, the mainland officially assessed 36 PLA military strategists, with Chairman Mao ranking first and Peng Dehuai ranking fifth. Among the ten marshals, only Zhu De was ranked ahead of Peng Dehuai.
In a sense, from this ranking, we can see whether a general is powerful in battle, and how powerful he is.
From this ranking, we can see that Peng Dehuai is extremely powerful in fighting, and what is puzzling is that Peng Dehuai, who is so powerful in fighting, does not bring out many famous generals.
1. Chen Yi commented on the Northwest Field Army
In 1955, the People's Republic of China was awarded the title for the first time since the founding of the People's Republic of China.
Among the four major field armies, the four fields commanded by Lin Biao are the "biggest winners", and the number of generals and commanders is the highest in the whole army, followed by the three fields commanded by Chen Yi and Su Yu, and the one field commanded by Peng Dehuai has the smallest number of generals.
In this regard, some people raised their own questions, Peng Dehuai fought so well, why did he not train many famous generals?
Regarding this question, Chen Yi once gave a relatively pertinent answer.
Chen Yi once said to the staff around him: "Mr. Peng's Northwest Field Army is too poor and too small in number, they can't fight a big battle!" ”
It can be said that Chen Yi's evaluation has basically summarized the answer to the question of why Peng Dehuai has brought out not many famous generals.
In 1928, a few months after Zhu De and Chen Yi led the rebel troops to Jinggangshan, Peng Dehuai led the Pingjiang Uprising Red Fifth Army to Jinggangshan.
For the next few years, the two have been fighting side by side. During the Anti-Japanese War, Peng Dehuai served as the deputy commander-in-chief of the Eighth Route Army, Chen Yi was the commander of the New Fourth Army, during the War of Liberation, one led the Northwest Field Army, and the other served as the commander of Huaye.
Chen Yi was right.
Second, the Northwest Field Army is too poor and has too few troops
The Xiye led by Peng Dehuai was too poor, and its numbers were too small compared to other field armies, and with the foundation of the Northwest Field Army, it could not fight a big battle at all.
In the early days of the Liberation War, when the Northwest Field Army was formed, Peng Dehuai, the deputy commander-in-chief of the whole army, took the initiative to ask to go to the Northwest Field Army as commander.
When the Northwest Field Army was first established, it had only a few tens of thousands. In contrast, Lin Biao's Dongye and Chen Yi Suyu's Huaye troops have exceeded 100,000 people, and more importantly, the troops of Dongye and Huaye when they were formed were the elite of our army, and they were all ace troops that had experienced the baptism of the Anti-Japanese War.
For example, when Luo Ronghuan went to the northeast, he brought 60,000 elite soldiers from the Shandong Military Region, in addition, Luo Ronghuan also took more than 30,000 outstanding cadres from the Shandong base area, and these 90,000 people formed the backbone of Dongye.
Not only that, but later Huang Kecheng also brought out 30,000 people from the Third Division of the New Fourth Army to the Northeast at the end of September 1945.
After the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, there were more than 200,000 people in the Shandong Military Region, Luo Ronghuan took away tens of thousands, and the remaining 100,000 people, as well as a part of the New Fourth Army, formed Huaye, these troops are also the elite of a hundred battles.
Let's take a look at the Northwest Field Army, when Xiye was formed, the strength was only 30,000 or 40,000 people, except for a part of the regular army of the Eighth Route Army belonging to the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningbo base area, when Xiye was first formed, a large part of the troops came from the local armed forces.
Therefore, through comparison, it can be found that the Northwest Field Army commanded by Peng Dehuai was initially inferior to Dongye and Huaye in terms of strength and elite.
With few troops and insufficient combat effectiveness, it is naturally impossible to fight a war or a big battle, and it is naturally difficult to train more famous generals.
There are few famous generals trained by Peng Dehuai, and it has a lot to do with the fact that the Northwest Battlefield is far away from the core battlefield of the Liberation War.
The three major battles were decisive battles that decided the fate of the Chinese revolution, and none of these three decisive battles were participated in by the Northwest Field Army.
In the Dongye and Huaye movements, when hundreds of thousands, or even millions, were decisive battles, the Northwest Field Army fought in the northwest region, and the scale of battles was basically not very large, and there were very few battles of more than 300,000 people.
The lack of a sufficient war stage, the opponent of the Northwest Field Army is not the real trump card of the Kuomintang, which makes the Northwest Field Army naturally unable to fight many big battles, you know, big battles are the easiest to train famous generals.
3. Are there really few famous generals brought out by Peng Dehuai?
Of course, there are not many famous generals brought out by Peng Dehuai, this sentence itself has limitations, and the famous generals brought out by Peng Dehuai cannot be judged simply from the Liberation War.
If we pull the timeline to the period of the Red Army, then we can say that Peng Dehuai brought out no fewer famous generals than any marshal.
On October 9, 1950, after Peng Dehuai was appointed as the commander of the Chinese People's Volunteers by the Central Committee, he immediately came to the northeast accompanied by deputy commander Deng Hua, where Peng Dehuai met with Liang Xingchu, commander of the 38th Army, Wu Xinquan, commander of the 39th Army, and other military and political cadres of the first batch of military and political cadres who entered the Korean combat unit.
When Peng Dehuai met with the commanders and political commissars of the six armies, several army commanders and political commissars said one sentence: Mr. Peng, during the Red Army, I was a soldier under you.
For example, during the Red Army, Wu Xinquan was a subordinate of Peng Dehuai's Red Third Army.
There are also more than a dozen generals such as Huaye's chief of staff Chen Shiyu, Nakano fierce general Yang Yong, 38 lieutenant generals, and more than 100 major generals, they were all tiger generals of the Red Third Army during the Red Army, and Peng Dehuai served as the Red Third Army Corps for five years, and these generals are of course famous generals brought out by Peng Dehuai.
Returning to the problem that there are not many famous generals in Yiye commanded by Peng Dehuai, there are not many famous generals in Yiye, this is not a problem of Peng Dehuai's personal ability, on the contrary, in such a difficult situation as Yiye's small troops, weak weapons and equipment, and poverty, Peng Dehuai was able to lead Yiye to defeat the well-equipped Hu Zongnan and the Northwest Majia Army step by step, which is enough to show that Peng Dehuai is extremely powerful in fighting.
You must know that Peng Dehuai's opponent is very powerful.
Hu Zongnan's department not only has hundreds of thousands of people, but also has a lot of elite weapons and equipment under his command. In addition, Ma Jiajun is also not weak, you must know that at the beginning of 1937, more than 20,000 Red Army West Route Army commanded by Xu Xiangqian was finally annihilated under the continuous attack of Ma Jiajun.
How good is Peng Dehuai's war? Chairman Mao's sentence "I am the only general", wrote Peng Dehuai's invincibility on the battlefield. The great victory of the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea showed the world how powerful Peng Dehuai was in the war, and Stalin commented that Peng Dehuai was one of the most powerful generals in the East.