Author: Cowherds in Su District
In 1940, when a cloud was shrouded over the Yellow Bridge and smoke billowed over it, Han Deqin, chairman of Jiangsu and deputy commander-in-chief of the Lusu Theater, led 26 regiments totaling more than 30,000 people to kill and rush to try to encircle and suppress the New Fourth Army in northern Jiangsu led by Chen and Su. Han Deloitte's troops were divided into three roads: the middle road was the Yan clan unit and was the main force of the attack; the right road was Li Mingyang, Li Changjiang, and the Chen Taiyun Department of the Taxation Police Corps; and the left road was 5 security brigades, including the Bao 1 Brigade.
Su Yu
Han Deqin also divided the middle road into three roads and assigned the operational task of pointing directly at the Yellow Bridge: the left wing was the 33rd Division of the 89th Army, attacking the east side of the Yellow Bridge from the after-strength and demarcation; the right wing was the Independent 6th Brigade, which went south from Gaoqiao to attack the north of the Yellow Bridge; and in the center was the 117th Division of the 89th Army personally commanded by Commander Li Shouwei, as well as the direct subordinate units and artillery of the army headquarters, from Yingxi south to attack the northeast of the Yellow Bridge.
The total strength of the troops commanded by Chen and Su was only 7,000 people, and only 5,000 people could fight, which was at a disadvantage compared with any of Han Deloitte's roads. However, the New Fourth Army, which is backed by the gushing Yangtze River, has no way to retreat, and must win a battle in a broken boat, otherwise it will really be driven down the Yangtze River to "feed the fish" and bid farewell to northern Jiangsu from then on.
Chi Haotian, Su Yu's old subordinate, said that the confrontation between the two armies is not only a contest of strength, firepower, and morale, but also a contest between the strategic level and command art of the commanders of the two sides. For Su Yu at this time, this thought was by no means as simple as "frowning and counting on the heart". He was well aware of the heavy responsibility and cautious, and finally decided to take the Yellow Bridge as the axis to lure the enemy deeper, not only to break the attacking enemy, but also to protect the Yellow Bridge.
After the plan was determined, he began to consider the target of the first battle, and after analyzing and comparing several main forces of Han Deloitte, Su Yu targeted Wengda's independent 6 regiments, and many years later, he still remembered why Wengda was chosen: "The main basis for this choice is that although Li Mingyang, Li Changbu, and Chen Taiyun have expressed neutrality, they have great doubts under the situation that Han Deloitte's army is pressing on us. If we annihilate the Weng Brigade in the first battle, it will play an important role in opening up the distance between Li Mingyang, Li Changjiang, and Chen Taiyun and Han Deloitte, and stabilizing Li and Chen's position, so that Han Deloitte's right wing will lose cover. Second, the Weng Brigade is the right wing of Han Deloitte's middle road, and eliminating it will open a gap in Han Deloitte's Middle Route Army, so that our army can encircle and detour the main force of the ROK army. Third, the Weng Brigade is the main force of Han Deloitte's lineage, and if it is annihilated in the first battle, it can seriously deal a serious blow to the morale of the enemy army and make other miscellaneous troops dare not move. ”
The Weng Brigade is one of Han Deloitte's only strong brigades, with more than 3,000 officers, most of the officers are military school graduates who have read military books and tactics, all of them are "medium and formal" 79 rifles, and each infantry company is equipped with 9 new Czech machine guns. Brigade Commander Weng Da can also be regarded as the "proud son of heaven", graduated from the fourth phase of the Whampoa Military Academy, and was a classmate of Lin Biao, Liu Zhidan, Zhang Lingfu and others at the same time, able to fight good battles and quite wise, and Jiang Shi was very kind to him, calling him "Weng Hu" general.
Han Deloitte is also a veteran of the battlefield, who has been in battle for a long time, and has "encircled and suppressed" the Red Army in his early years, knowing that the Operational Principle of the Red Army is to fight the weak enemy first and then the strong enemy. He and Onda never expected that Su Yu would do the opposite this time, first looking for a strong enemy to attack, thus taking him by surprise and hitting him by surprise.
After determining the battle plan and the first annihilation target, Su Yu was determined to boldly use the surprise troops and carefully deploy the three columns under his command. Ye Fei's first column and Wang Bicheng's second column were relatively well armed, and Su Yu used them in the direction of the assault and secretly assembled in the Gugaozhuang, Yanxuzhuang, and Henggangqiao areas northwest of Huangqiao. He also had the Second Column send two battalions to exercise a defensive movement to lure the enemy deeper.
Fei
Tao Yong's three columns numbered less than 2,000 men, and Su Yu decided to arrange for him to garrison the Yellow Bridge, and at the same time ordered him to send a battalion to the area west of the demarcation to actively block the enemy with scattered warfare, slow down his movements, and exhaust his troops.
The Japanese army in northern Jiangsu is also the sworn enemy of the New Fourth Army, and Su Yu also made a detailed analysis of whether they would come to take advantage of the fire and robbery, and finally believed that the situation of the joint attack between the Japanese army and Han Deloitte would not appear, and would only sit on the mountain and watch the tiger fight, calculating the benefits of the fisherman.
What he was most worried about was the "two Li and one Chen" who promised to remain neutral, and there were no troops in his hands to deal with them, and once they turned their faces and stabbed them in the back, the consequences would be unimaginable. After Chen Yi heard about it, he reassured him and said, "The direction of Taizhou is up to me and Zhu Kejing." Just in case, Chen Yi and Su Yu discussed transferring the two main battalions remaining in Jiangnan and sent a note to Li Mingyang and Li Changjiang: "The two regiments of our army are about to cross the river through your army's defense zone. ", suggesting that they should not act rashly. Su Yu thus made the final decision of the battle.
On September 30, Han Deloitte ordered the attack to begin, and his troops rushed out, but they suddenly encountered a torrential downpour, which could not be opened for several days, and Jiang's army had to slow down the marching speed, and finally had to stop advancing. The units of the New Fourth Army were given sufficient time to carefully deploy their troops and consolidate their positions.
On October 3, the heavy rain finally stopped, and a few rays of sunlight leaked out of the gloomy cloud cracks, and Han Deloitte, who was worried, breathed a sigh of relief. His general Li Shouwei, commander of the 89th Army, immediately shook his spirits and ordered his men to attack and advance. Ye Fei and Wang Bicheng's troops blocked the attack one after another, pretending to be invincible, and "retreating in a hurry", forcing them to launch an early attack formation. The officers and men of the 89th Army, seeing that the New Fourth Army was vulnerable and collapsed at the first touch, were extremely excited, waved the flag and shouted, scrambled to be brave, divided into several roads to pounce on the Yellow Bridge, and began shelling the positions outside the Yellow Bridge at noon on the same day. In the early morning of the next day, the 33rd Division of the 89th Army fired in unison and attacked the east gate of the Yellow Bridge.
On the battlefield, the smoke of gunfire was filled with smoke and a big fight, and various political forces in northern Jiangsu were nervously staring at the Yellow Bridge. Li Mingyang and Chen Taiyun watched the battle situation, ready to stand on the side of the winner and obtain the greatest benefits, and the detectives of the Japanese army and the puppet army were also busy, shuttling back and forth, spying on the opportunity to attack.
On the morning of October 4, Li Shouwei launched the first general offensive, and in order to completely break the Yellow Bridge defense line, he threw more than 3 regiments at a time. For a moment, the sound of gunfire was tremendous, and the battlefield was covered with dust and sand, and the sky was dark. Most of the fortifications of Tao Yong's three columns were destroyed by artillery fire, and the officers and men suffered huge casualties, and the cooking squad guard squad was taken out and put on top. Soon, a unit of the 33rd Division broke through the east gate, and the defensive line was torn apart. Once the Yellow Bridge is lost, the consequences are unimaginable.
The pivotal moment that changed the tide of battle has come. Su Yu ordered Tao Yong to resolutely hold the Yellow Bridge and do his best to stop Li Shouwei's assault, especially to break his second general offensive at dusk. In order to preemptively attack, he instructed Tao Yong to attack the enemy first with a regiment or so of troops, breaking his general attack plan. Subsequently, Su Yu left the command post and went straight to the north gate, directly directing Ye Fei's column to pick up Onda.
Soon, scouts ran to report that the Ong Brigade's forwards had reached two or three kilometers north of the Yellow Bridge. For the sake of prudence, Su Yu personally climbed to the heights of Tucheng to observe, and found that many ordinary people ran to the southwest in panic and determined the situation described by the scouts.
He decided to strike immediately and carry out a multi-way assault, especially to first destroy the command of the Independent 6th Brigade. Ye Fei, who had been waiting for a long time, led an arson to attack quickly, inserted into Onda's marching column in 4 ways, cut it into several sections, and first destroyed the brigade headquarters and the rear guard regiment, forcing his vanguard regiment to return to reinforcements. Then, Ye Fei detoured back to the rear of Onda and surrounded him with a momentum. The entire battle was clean and clean, and it took only 3 hours to end, most of the Independent 6th Brigade was annihilated, and Lieutenant General Onda, the brigade commander, was ashamed and angry, and committed suicide. The 89th Army and its two divisions were also quickly annihilated, and Li Shouwei drowned when he fled across the river in panic. Han Deloitte, who was originally as strong as a cow, lost a clean and fled back to Xinghua with the remnants of more than a thousand people.
In order to fight the Battle of Huangqiao, Su Yu did not sleep well for seven days, and he was extremely tired, and on the way to follow the pursuing troops, he could not help but doze off during the day and fell off his horse.
The life-and-death duel at Huangqiao was clear, and the New Fourth Army won a great victory with fewer victories, annihilating more than 11,000 Han Deloittes and capturing countless guns, ammunition, and military supplies. Chen Yi and Su Yu won in danger, desperately survived, and gained a vast and free world.
[Deeply cultivate the history of war, carry forward positive energy, soldiers say that all parties are welcome to submit articles, private messages will be restored]