A generation of tyrants died on the battlefield: Why did Zhou Xicheng's war of attrition ultimately fail?

Wen | Zhou Yu

At that time, Chiang Kai-shek's primary target was the Gui clan, and for the warlords in the southwest, he still focused on co-opting, and in order to win over Zhou Xicheng, he appointed him as the commander-in-chief of the Ninth Route Army, but Zhou Xicheng did not buy it. Later, he sent people to persuade that Zhou Xicheng was still unable to advance, and Jiang had to support Yuan Zuming's old department, Li Shen, who was then the commander of the 43rd Army of the National Revolutionary Army, and ordered him to counterattack Guizhou. As a result, Li Bu was defeated by Zhou Xicheng as soon as he left the division, and had to switch to Long Yun.

On March 22, Chiang Kai-shek was ready to go on a crusade against the Gui clan, and detained Li Jishen, who had been sent to Nanjing for a meeting, to give the local warlords a chance to get off the horse. As soon as this matter came out, feng Yuxiang and Yan Xishan, the great warlords, did not act, but Zhou Xicheng took the lead in sending a telegram and asking: "Li Rengong followed Junzao, and he has been doing it for many years, and he has not worked hard. Now because he went to Beijing for a meeting, he was detained, even if Jun Tian was drunk and unjustly snowed, but justice is in the people, and it is easy to prevent bandits in Sichuan, and how to prevent the world from doing so will be at stake. Before the power generation, the left and right had dissuaded Zhou Xicheng, saying that his telegram was too fierce, and that he should first observe the situation before it was too late, but Zhou Xicheng did not listen, but instead had the arrogance of breaking the boat: "Success is the king, defeat is Kou, the big husband does things, the light is upright, how can the first rat be at both ends?" Besides, li Rengong was in trouble, and the whole country sympathized, if my generation did not speak out in righteousness, what was the intention? ”

A few days later, the Jiang-Gui War broke out, and Long Yun, after weighing the pros and cons, decided to support Chiang kai-shek and join forces with Li Shen's Chen Bing on the Border of Dianqian as a deterrent. In order to make the division famous, Long Yun and Li Shen jointly sent telegrams to Chiang Kai-shek, and after several weeks, Xi Cheng's "crimes" were: such as sending Mao Guangxiang to Guangxi to collude with the Gui clan against the central authorities, killing important officials sent by the Kuomintang Central Committee, planting opium, controlling young people, and so on, and asking for permission to go on a crusade. At this time, Chiang Kai-shek also wanted to en-wei and exert both grace and power, and finally won over Zhou Xicheng, calling: "100,000 fires are urgent." At present, the central authorities are determined to win the favor, and it is imperative. Brother Wang Jibin (Zhou Xichengzi) immediately made a decision, telegraphed to support the central authorities, do not hesitate, and immediately look forward to the telegram. Seeing this telegram with the meaning of an ultimatum, Zhou Xicheng laughed and dismissed it: "This knife threatens the ears, and I am not afraid." There were not many two divisions of the Dian Army, and I intended to fight with Hu and Zhang to fight with him and slay this evil dragon. Then, they united with Guangdong, Guizhou, Yunnan, and Qian, organized a coalition army, and went east to beg thieves to alleviate the country's difficulties. ”

At this point, Chiang Kai-shek could only change his mind to suppression, appointIng Long Yun as the commander-in-chief of the Tenth Route Army and Li Shen as the commander-in-chief of the former enemy, and appointing the three brigades (later changed to divisions) of the Dian Army generals Zhu Xiaodong, Zhang Fengchun, and Meng Kun to be under the command of Li Shen. Li Jun's troops in Dian were organized as guards and instructed two battalions, and they followed the army headquarters. The remaining two routes cooperated with the Dian army in flanking operations. After the combined forces of Li and Long invaded Guizhou, they took two roads, Liankepan County, Pu'an, and Qinglong, and took Guansuoling. Zhou Xicheng sent his troops to lead Huang Daobin to lead the main force of the 25th Army to meet the battle, but as a result, they were defeated and retreated, and Li Jun took Guan suoling without much effort. In order to stabilize the war situation, Zhou Xicheng ordered Huang Daobin to retreat to the top of the slope to lay out defensive positions, and personally led the old 2nd Battalion and the troops available in Guiyang to the Zhenning front and to the Huangguoshu area to form a confrontation with Li Jun.

In the early 1930s, Chiang Kai-shek took a group photo with Long Yun, the "King of Yunnan"

Zhou Xicheng originally planned to fight a war of attrition with Li Shen by virtue of the steep mountain terrain and gradually consume his living forces. However, Li Shen had suffered heavy losses in the previous battle against Zhou Xicheng, and this time he learned a lesson, and after capturing Guansuoling, he concentrated his superior forces and attacked the Zhou army at all costs. The battle was fought very fiercely, and Zhou Xicheng's chief of staff, Liu Minjie, personally went to the front line to direct the battle, and was wounded by artillery fire, and the army seemed to collapse. Zhou Xi saw that the situation was not good, and personally went to Jigong Mountain to supervise the battle, but he was hit by a stray bullet, and a generation of tyrants died on the battlefield. Zhou Jun saw that the commander was killed, the front was shaken, and the Li army attacked fiercely, and it was quickly defeated. Most of the remnants of the 25th Army, which had lost its commander, retreated to Zunyi. On May 28, Li Shen led his troops into Guiyang as a victor and formed the Guizhou Provincial Provisional Administrative Committee.

When Li Shen entered Guiyang, he did not know that Zhou Xicheng had died in battle, and only sent a telegram to Nanjing to report the victory. At this time, the Jiang-Gui War was also nearing its end, the defeat of the Gui clan had been decided, and the good news came from the southwest, which was another battlefield in the Jiang-Gui War, chiang kai-shek was naturally overjoyed, and immediately appointed Li Shen as the chairman of Guizhou Province, and posthumously ordered Zhou Xicheng to be wanted. Unfortunately, Li Shen, the governor of the province, only served for 18 days, and Zhou Xicheng's old generals Mao Guangxiang, Yu Guocai, Wang Jialie, and other generals quickly reorganized the 25th Army, launched a counterattack, and drove Li Shen out of Guiyang and retreated to Yunnan. A folk song satirizing Li Shen began to circulate in Guiyang: "Eighteen years of the Republic of China, eighteen circles of Hanban." Eighteen sons came and sat for eighteen days. ”

After Li Shen was expelled, the military and political power in Guizhou returned to the hands of the Warlords of the Tongzi clan, and Mao Guangxiang was replaced by Mao Guangxiang. At this time, the Victory and Defeat of the Jiang-Gui War had already been won, and Mao Guangxiang also changed the policy of politically uniting with Guizhou against Chiang Kai-shek and "closing the door to hegemony" during the Zhou Xicheng period, and sent a telegram to support Chiang Kai-shek and the Nanjing government. Soon, he also received feedback from Chiang Kai-shek—on October 2, the Nationalist government officially appointed Mao Guangxiang as commander of the 25th Army and chairman of the Guizhou provincial government.