Author: Mo Guyan
As we all know, in the famous Battle of Chosin Lake to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, the 9th Corps of the Volunteer Army suffered severe frostbite due to insufficient combat preparation in extremely cold weather, and the non-combat attrition even exceeded the combat attrition, which can be called a major lesson.
However, this is not the first time that our army has fought in extremely cold weather. In the winter of 1947, a great war of unprecedented scale broke out in the black land of the northeast, and the Northeast Field Army under Lin Biao launched a winter offensive against the Northeast Chiang Kai-shek Army led by Chen Cheng, and the two warring sides braved the cold of minus 40 degrees Celsius to fight to the death, leaving unforgettable memories.
Since the second half of 1947, the strength of our army in the northeast has snowballed, and in half a year, 370,000 troops of the new local military district have been built, and they have been continuously replenished into the main column. By the end of the year, the total strength of Lin Biao's troops had reached more than 730,000 people, including 9 columns and 10 independent divisions of the field army, totaling more than 420,000 people.
Lin Biao at the East Field Headquarters
Since Chen Cheng presided over the overall situation in the northeast as the chief of staff, he used thunderbolt means to expand the armament war, quickly set up three new armies of the New 3rd Army, the New 5th Army, and the New 7th Army, and tried every means to reorganize the troops damaged in the autumn offensive. In Chen Cheng's view, Lin Biao would not let the troops fight in temperatures of minus 30 or 40 degrees under any circumstances, which was a basic common sense.
Of course, Lin Biao would not sit idly by and watch Chen Cheng expand his reorganization, not to mention that he was not very satisfied with the results of the autumn offensive, so he was determined to fight another battle, targeting the Shenyang to Jinzhou section of the Bac Ninh line.
On December 15, in the midst of the snow and ice, Lin Biao launched a winter offensive. At this time, the temperature in the Songliao Plain was below -30 °C.
The battle was fought simultaneously in Faku, Zhangwu and Xinlitun, north and west of Shenyang. Liang Xingchu's 10 columns plus Liu Zhen's 2 columns attacked the 62nd Division of the New 6th Army stationed in Faku, Deng Hua's 7th Column plus the 2nd Column besieged the 79th Division of the 49th Army stationed in Zhangwu, Duan Suquan's 8th Column and Zhan Caifang's 9th Column were responsible for annihilating the 26th Division of the 49th Army stationed in Xinlitun. The remaining columns were responsible for reinforcements.
Lin Biao's large-scale attack greatly surprised Chen Cheng, and he urgently ordered Liu Anqi's army to go south for reinforcements. The stubborn resistance of Jiang's army also surprised Lin Biao, and Dongye's attacks on Faku, Zhangwu, and Xinlitun were not smooth. In order to open a stalemate before Liu Anqi's army moved south, Lin Biao resolutely adjusted his deployment and besieged Faku with 10 columns, concentrating 2 columns, 7 columns and artillery columns, all of which were put into the attack on Zhangwu.
The 79th Division of the 49th Army, the defender of Zhangwu, suffered heavy losses in Jinxi three months earlier, and a large number of new recruits had not yet had time to train after the war. Among the three defenders, the 79th Division was definitely the weakest in combat effectiveness, which was why Lin Biao wanted to use them as a breakthrough. This adjustment was indeed immediate, the siege force quickly broke through the city, and the commander of the 79th Division, Wen Li, escaped in disguise, which was also the second time he escaped from the siege after he arrived in the northeast.
Wen Li, who graduated from the Huangpu Fifth Artillery Section, was an old man of the 79th Division, with rich combat experience, especially a set of organizational defenses, and many Eastern Field Generals spoke highly of him. However, Wen Li was dissatisfied because he did not become a military commander, and before the war, he was still playing in Shenyang City, and was sued by the military commander Zheng Tingji, which returned to Zhangwu's division headquarters. After the war, Chiang was shot for leaving his post without permission.
On the same day that Dongye conquered Zhangwu, Chen Cheng ordered his troops to reinforce Faku in four ways to seek a decisive battle with Lin Biao's main force: two divisions of Chen Lindaxin's 5th Army on the left road went north from Shenyang via Xinmin to Faku; Liu Anqi's corps on the middle road went north from Shenyang; Liao Yaoxiang's corps on the middle road went north from Tieling; and Pan Yukun's new 1st army on the right road advanced west from Siping.
Lin Biao analyzed the enemy situation and judged that chen Lindaxin's 5th Army on the left side was the weakest and was likely to reach the theater first, so he decided to gather the main force to surround and annihilate the army: Liu Zhen's 2nd Column, Han Xianchu's 3rd Column, Hong Xuezhi's 6th Column, Deng Hua's 7th Column, and Su Jing's Artillery Column were responsible for encircling and annihilating the New 5th Army; the 5th Independent Division was responsible for blocking the New 1st Army; Liang Xingchu's 10th Column continued to besiege Faku with the 29th Division; the remaining 28th, 30th Divisions and 1st Column 3rd Division were responsible for blocking Liao Yaoxiang's corps; Li Tianyou's 1st Column, Wu Kehua's 4th Column, and Independent 2nd Division were responsible for blocking Liu Anqi's Corps.
The New 5th Army departed from Shenyang on January 1 and got off at the Xinmin Juliuhe Station, but because the temperature was as low as -40 ° C, the cars and tanks could not be started, so the New 5th Army only carried ammunition and grain for three days and hurried on the road, and most of the weight remained in the Juliuhe. On January 2, the New 5th Army was blocked by Hong Xuezhi's 6th Column, and the fierce battle lasted until dusk on the 4th, and the New 5th Army advanced to the Gongzhutun area. At dawn on the 5th, 12 divisions of 4 columns in Dongye completed the encirclement of two divisions of the New 5th Army.
Artillery of the Northeast Field Army
Until the night of the 7th, Chen Linda, commander of the New 5th Army, Liu Guangtian, commander of the 43rd Division, and Xie Daisheng, commander of the 195th Division, were all captured, and more than 3,000 people in the whole army broke through, and the remaining 20,000 people were destroyed. Chen Linda became chiang's first commander to be captured since his departure from customs in November 1945.
Chen Linda and Lin Biao, a native of Xiangtan, Hunan, are both Huangpu Phase IV students, and there are recalls that the two once lived in the same dormitory bunk bed, and the friendship was very unusual. Unexpectedly, the two became opponents in the northeast battlefield, and had fought fiercely many times in Siping, Tonghua and other places. Lin Biao had initially written a handwritten letter to persuade Chen to revolt but was rejected, and eventually had to fight each other.
In the Battle of Gongzhutun, although Dongye completely annihilated the New 5th Army, it also paid a heavy price of more than 20,000 casualties, nearly half of which were frostbite. This shows that in the extremely cold weather, the losses suffered by the troops must be staggering. After the battle, Lin Biao had to order the whole army to rest and recuperate, and after surviving the severe cold of March 9, he would look for a fighter.
An Eastfield warrior who fights in extremely cold weather
Liu Anqi, the commander of Chiang Kai-shek's army who took part in this battle, later fled to Taiwan Island, and decades later, he still had a lingering feeling about the terrible cold of the northeast winter, describing it in his memoirs: "In the heavy snow, the gun bolts are frozen, and sometimes the fingers touch the iron or steering wheel and sometimes can no longer move, and people may never get up again when they jump off the car; we pour sorghum stalks with hot water, and in a moment we automatically become frozen fortifications as hard as iron; when we shoot with machine guns, many times we can't see clearly, because there are snowflakes in front of us." ”
Liu Anqi paid tribute to Lin Biao's troops for being able to have such a powerful mobile combat capability in the extreme cold of -40 ° C.
The captured Chen Linda was first sent to Gongdelin and then transferred to the Fushun War Criminals Management Center, where he died in 1970 without waiting for the day of amnesty.
[Deeply cultivate the history of war, carry forward positive energy, soldiers say welcome to submit, private messages will be restored]