Central Plains "catch big fish".
Remembering the Battle of Juqi.
Fei. 
The Battle of Suiqi, also known as the Battle of Eastern Henan, was a battle of annihilation of a large corps of our army that was transferred to the outer front. The victory in this battle changed the strategic situation of the Central Plains and East China battlefields. Therefore, in the Central Plains battlefield, the enemy completely lost the ability to launch a campaign offensive against our army, shaking confidence in holding strategic points.
Attack Kaifeng to lure the enemy to come to help.
In the spring of 1948, when he was training in Puyang, the representative of the commander-in-chief came to our First Corps.
The 1st, 4th, and 6th columns inspected and put forward specific tasks: to eliminate the Fifth Army, the main force of the Kuomintang army, and other units, and the specific tactical means was to "catch big fish."
After the training was completed, we immediately plunged into the Central Plains battlefield. At that time, the situation in the Central Plains was still grim.
On the battlefield in the Central Plains, in addition to the security forces, the enemy had 25 reorganized divisions of the regular army, attempting to control the communication lines of the eastern section of Longhai Road, Jinpu Road, and the southern section of Pinghan Road, and taking Zhengzhou, Xinyang, Bengbu, Kaifeng, Shangqiu, and other cities as strongholds.
On the evening of 30 May, our three main columns crossed the Yellow River south. This action greatly shocked the enemy, and he hurriedly transferred the main force of Qiu Qingquan's corps and the reorganized 75th Division north to the southwestern part of Shandong to meet our river-crossing troops. At the same time, a brigade of the 83rd, 25th, 72nd, and 63rd Divisions was reorganized in an attempt to fight a decisive battle with our river-crossing troops.
In this way, the enemy's strength concentrated in the southwestern Shandong battlefield will reach 9 to 11 integrated divisions, and the formation is dense and difficult to divide, and it will be difficult for our army to achieve the goal of annihilating the enemy in each direction.
On 3 June, ** called and instructed: "In the entire Central Plains situation, there are many opportunities to fight sports warfare. But it is necessary to be patient and mobilize the enemy in many ways to create opportunities. "After you arrive at the appropriate area, you will not rest for three days, but for about half a month, and the whole army will carefully study technology and tactics to recuperate. Even if there is an opportunity to fight a small battle, the main force should not fight. ......Then take action to mobilize the enemy and annihilate the enemy in motion. First, do not rush to seek fame and solve big problems, but be patient and calm and take the initiative at any time. ”
In accordance with the spirit of this instruction and the current enemy situation, Commander Su Yudai felt that under these circumstances, it was not very certain that the Fifth Army would be reorganized in search of the enemy, and that the enemy's troops in the vast areas of eastern Henan were empty, so he changed his plan to fight in southwestern Shandong, turned to eastern Henan, and resolved to first open the seal and then annihilate the enemy. First of all, the main force (Chen Tang Corps) besieged Kaifeng, which was relatively weak in the enemy's garrison and at the critical point of the enemy's defense, to attract the enemy in Xuzhou to come to help, and then concentrate the main force.
The 1st, 4th, and 6th columns annihilated the enemy who came to their aid during the movement. On the morning of 17 June, ** approved this arrangement, and ** comrades also called in favor of this arrangement.
So, the first. 3. The siege group composed of the eighth column was commanded by Chen Shiyu and Tang Liang and launched an attack on Kaifeng;On the morning of the 22nd, the defending enemy was completely annihilated.
After our army captured Kaifeng, the Kuomintang ruling group was very shocked and in chaos. On 24 June, the puppet Legislative Yuan hastily held a secret meeting to review the war situation in the Central Plains. In order to salvage the defeat, Chiang Kai-shek ordered Qiu Qingquan's corps and Liu Ruming's division of the Fourth Appeasement Zone to attack and advance from southwest Lu to Kaifeng, and at the same time formed a corps with the reorganized 75th Division, the 72nd Division and the newly formed 21st Brigade, with Ou Shounian as the commander, to move back to Kaifeng from the Minquan area through Sui County and Qi County, in an attempt to fight a decisive battle with our army in the Kaifeng area. Originally, the purpose of our army to carry out the Kaifeng Campaign was not only to capture the city and annihilate the enemy, but more importantly, to lure the enemy to come to help. Since the enemy wants to open the seal, let the opening be given to it. Let it carry the burden on its back and disperse its forces, so that our army can concentrate its forces to seek and destroy the enemy in the movement.
At this time, the enemy Hu Lian Corps was defeated by our midfield.
The 1st and 3rd Columns and the 10th Huaye Column blocked the area north of Shangcai, and the enemy's Sun Yuanliang Corps was blocked by the 9th Column of Zhongye and the troops of the Henan-Anhui Soviet Military Region in Zhongmu. ** Comrades also deployed the Shandong Corps to attack Yanzhou and Jining. The Northern Jiangsu Corps overcame the scattered enemy in the eastern section of the Longhai Railway and mobilized the enemy forces in Xuzhou. On June 26, ** telegraphed: "The enemy's 83rd Division has been transferred to Chongzhou, the 25th Division has been sent to Tengxian, and the main force has returned to Xuzhou." Chiang Kai-shek and Bai Chongxi seemed to judge that Su Yu, Chen Shiyu, and Zhang Zhen marched south to join up with the Eighteenth Army, so they ordered Qiu Qingquan and Ou Shounian to advance to the southwest from the line of Minquan, Lanfeng, and Kaifeng, in order to jointly attack our army, and Qiu's army defended Kaifeng with one part. Under these circumstances, Su Chenzhang was deployed in Sui County, Qi County, and the line of Tongxu (or south of this line), and it was very appropriate to annihilate the enemy all the way, if he could annihilate him.
Seven. Ten. Of course, the 5th and 72nd Divisions are better, otherwise it would be good to be able to annihilate the 75th Division. The enemy commander Nakaku, Shou Nian, had less experience in combat with our army. ”
Commander Su Yudai of the field army was determined to seize this favorable opportunity, fight continuously, take the initiative to abandon Kaifeng City, and encircle and annihilate the weaker Shounian Corps all the way to the enemy area. Order.
I. Fourth, the Sixth Column, the Liangguang Column, and the Eleventh Column of the Jinyuan Field Army formed an assault group, designated by me, to covertly assemble in the civil rights area between Sui County, Qi County, and Taikang, and carry out a north-south flank attack to encircle and annihilate the district corps. The other units were directly commanded by Ye Si and formed a blocking group, with the Chen Tang Corps serving as the isolation of Qiu and the District Corps and preventing the Qiu Qingquan Corps from coming to the east, and the Nakano 1st Column and the Huaye 10th Column still served as the task of containing and blocking the enemy's Hu Lian Corps.
Encirclement and annihilation of the district corps captured alive the life of the district.
The battle of the Shounian Corps (i.e., the Battle of Suiqi) was launched on the night of 29 June.
Although the district corps was weaker than the Qiu Corps in terms of the number of troops and technical equipment, the corps was originally a part of the 19th Route Army, and its combat effectiveness was very strong. Ou Shounian is a person with rich practical experience;This time, the deputy commander of the Sixth Sui District concurrently served as the commander of the Seventh Corps, and his actions were relatively cautious, which became a sharp contrast to Qiu Qingquan's arrogance. And our assault group does not have an advantage in terms of troops: the 11th Column of Nakano is armed in the military region;The Liangguang Column had only three small regiments. However, the three main columns that crossed the river and headed south were reorganized and trained in Yinyang and encouraged by Commander-in-Chief Zhu's inspection, and their morale was very high, their desire to fight was eager, and their military technology was also greatly improved. So my assault group has a big advantage in quality. Therefore, ** believes that "in Sui County, Qi County, and the line of Tongxu (or south of this line), it is very appropriate to destroy the enemy all the way." But he also pointed out: "If you can annihilate it."
Seven. Ten. Of course, the 5th and 72nd divisions are better, otherwise it would be good to be able to annihilate the 75th division. ”
At that time, Chiang Kai-shek underestimated the combat strength of our army, believing that our army had been wounded after the Kaifeng Battle and "did not seem to have any positive intentions." After Qiu Qingquan entered and occupied Kaifeng, the main force rushed straight to Tongxu, but Ou Shounian judged that our army had the appearance of attacking the Pinghan Road and hesitated, and the distance was widened, forming a gap of 40 kilometers. In addition, the information obtained at that time showed that due to the siege of Yanzhou by our Shandong Corps and the enemy's Huang Baitao Corps reinforcing Yanzhou, there was no mobile force in the direction of Xuzhou. Therefore, in order to seize this favorable opportunity to annihilate the enemy, Chief Noji issued an operational order to encircle and annihilate the regional corps on 27 July, without waiting to find out the specific deployment of the district corps.
Due to the slow advance of the enemy corps, it only advanced to the south of the Huiji River on the 27th. The head of the Noji Division agreed that we should take a leap forward and carry out the deployment of dividing the enemy on the battlefield: with the fourth column and commanding the Liangguang Column, we would attack and advance from Qixian to the areas of Yindian, Lütun, and Baiyunsi;The first column advanced from Sui County to Longwangdian and Chen Xiaolou;The sixth column attacked and advanced from Xiling Temple, Peicundian, and Tatediling;The 11th Column of Nakano advanced from Neihuang to the southwest of Yindian, and was tasked with blocking the enemy who might come to the aid from the direction of Xuzhou. At 20 o'clock that night, the district corps had already shrunk and had not achieved any results. At dawn on the 28th, we wedged into the joint of the enemy's 75th and 72nd Divisions, captured 16 villages, and completely severed the connection between the two divisions. The Sixth Column completed the encirclement of Yanggui and Yuxiangpu enemies. The fourth column occupies the northwest line of Longwangdian. The 11th Column attacked the front line of Longtanggang and compressed the enemy's new 21st Brigade in the Chen Xiaolou area. At this point, I have completed the task of dividing and encircling the district corps. Although the troops of the 75th Division and the 72nd Division of the enemy, we fought hard all day long, and broke the counterattacking enemy forces respectively.
On the evening of the 29th, the division attacked the enemy at Changlangtun, and the battle was fierce, and the first column finally threw in a new force, the column guard battalion, desperate to open the battle situation, and completely annihilated the enemy at Changlangtun at 8 o'clock on the 30th. At the same time, the 11th Column and the 6th Column and the 18th Division annihilated most of the enemy's New 21st Brigade, and joined forces with the 4th Column to continue to purge the remnants of the enemy's New 21st Brigade.
On 1 July, the general attack on Longwangdian, after repeated charges, dawn our troops broke into one after another, Tianming completely annihilated the 46th Regiment of the Shounian Corps Headquarters of the enemy area, the headquarters of the 75th Division and the 16th Brigade, and captured the Shounian and division commander Shen Chengnian alive. Ou Shounian also had to admit that due to the unpopularity of the civil war, there was only a defeat.
Maintain the initiative to win the transfer.
Under these circumstances, Chiang Kai-shek panicked and could no longer sit still. On 2 July, he did not hesitate to take Air Force Commander-in-Chief Zhou Zhirou to supervise the battle in the airspace over Qixian County in his capacity as commander-in-chief, and strictly ordered Qiu Qingquan to quickly attack and advance and join up with the district corps. He also urgently ordered the enemy's reorganized 25th Division, which had been reorganized from Xuzhou to Yanzhou to Tengxian County, to move westward as soon as possible, and to gather the Third Rapid Column and the Second Traffic Police Corps to form a corps, with Huang Baitao as the commander of the corps, and galloped to aid Sui County day and night.
After the war, the "warrant" written by Chiang Kai-shek to Qiu Qingquan at 6 p.m. on July 2 in Xuzhou was seized, and the full text was copied below as evidence. Punctuation has been added for ease of reading.
Yu'an Army's Elder Brother Xunjian: Longwangdian fell, and if the two comrades Ou Shounian and Shen Chengnian had not been killed, they would have been captured. The war situation in the Central Plains is extremely serious. In the past two days, he ordered his brother to go east with all his strength to reinforce him, but his brother violated the order and delayed, and did not come to the aid of his allies in danger, resulting in the greatest loss. Retribution, miserable within five, I don't know what to do!Therefore, this afternoon, I am very hopeful to talk to my brother in the air and urge the rush to save the danger of the friendly forces of Yuxiangpu and the Iron Buddha Temple!At this time, only the younger brother army rushed forward, while teaching and aiding the 75th Division in the Yuxiangpu Brigade and the 72nd Division of the Iron Buddha Temple;On the one hand, it joined up with the 25th Division advancing westward, so that the decline could be reversed, and the younger army was protected from being annihilated alone. The 25th Division has conquered Wang Laoji today and is attacking Dongdian, which is only four kilometers away from the Iron Buddha Temple, so the 72nd Division may be able to join up with the 25th Division tonight. However, if the younger brother did not go all out to advance eastward, the two divisions would have been affected by the fall of Longwangdian, and they would still feel that their forces were weak and they were in danger.
In short, no matter how the battle situation changes, it is necessary to cooperate with the younger division and the 25th and 72nd divisions to have any hope of turning defeat into victory, otherwise they will be defeated by each other. If the Central Plains operation fails this time, the future of the country will be unimaginable!And this responsibility lies with the Fifth Army, led by my brother. The younger brother is not only the main force of the Central Plains, but also the main force of the whole country's armies. Because I couldn't talk to my brother on the battlefield, I stopped in Xuzhou and wrote this letter airdrop, hoping that my brother could take heavy responsibility, save the overall situation, and atone for his sins!
Best regards. Rong Zhi.
Forehand open. Please look at this "hand enlightenment", anxiety, jumping on the paper. It is fair to say that Chiang Kai-shek was not incompetent militarily, and he won many battles in the warlord melee and did not rely solely on politician methods such as bribery, and victory on the battlefield was also an important factor. But his set of military art can only be played with between the hands of the hands compared with the military art of the *** comrade!
Kaifeng a dozen, driving Qiu Qingquan, Hu Lian, Sun Yuanliang, and Ou Shounian to Kaifeng one after another;Yanzhou was surrounded, and Huang Baitao was hurriedly sent to the north to help;Ou Shouben was annihilated, and Qiu, Hu, Sun, and Huang were driven by him to the Qixian area. It seems that Chiang Kai-shek commanded hundreds of thousands of troops to gallop on the battlefield in the Central Plains;In fact, he was commanded and mobilized by ***.
* Although the warrant was severe, the "Commander of the Yu'an" who led the "main force of all armies in the country" still blocked the line of Taolin Gang for our Chen Tang Corps and thwarted its offensive arrogance.
However, the position of our 11th Column in Nakano was broken through by the enemy's 25th Division!The 11th Column of the Nakano is a local unit of the Hebei-Shandong-Henan Military Region, and the armored troops of the enemy's 3rd Rapid Column suddenly appeared in front of them, without ideological preparation or technical preparation, and the disparity in strength was huge, and the position was ...... broken through by the enemy under the bombardment of the enemy's powerful firepower
I was going to take the first column.
The 1st and 3rd Divisions advanced to the east of Sui County and besieged the 72nd Division of the enemy at Wuli Temple and Iron Buddha Temple. When the 11th Column's position from Yangqiao to Liulou was broken through by the enemy, the 1st Division just arrived, and when it saw that the situation was critical, it asked the column for instructions, and ordered the division's special service battalion to attack Wang Laoji and maneuver to meet the enemy's Yellow CorpsHe also seized Chai Qi Dongdian before the enemy, prevented the enemy from moving closer to the 72nd Division, and was in a tense state of the enemy's east-west attack. July 2nd, I.
The 1st and 3rd Divisions fought fiercely on both sides of the enemy's 72nd Division in the west and the enemy's Yellow Corps in the east. The balance of forces on the battlefield has changed a lot, at first one corps against one corps, and now it has become one corps against two corps!
At this time, Noji ordered the first.
3. The 10th Column and the 1st Eighth Column continued to block the Qiu CorpsI was ordered to command most of the Eighth Column and one division of the Sixth Column to encircle and annihilate the remnants of the enemy's entire 75th Division.
1. The Fourth Column and most of the Sixth Column and the Liangguang Column attacked and annihilated the Yellow Corps, and the 11th Column of Nakano monitored the enemy's entire 72nd Division and served as a reserve for the campaign. The determination of the head of the Noji is great, give it to me and.
The telegram orders of the leaders of the 1st, 4th, 6th, 11th, Guanglong, and Cavalry regiments were very clear: "Our army should take advantage of the fact that the Yellow Corps is not firmly established and the fortifications are not solid, complete the encirclement this night, and then launch an attack, and continue to attack tomorrow and during the day, and strive for a quick decision, otherwise the battle will drag on and will be quite unfavorable to us, but the implementation of the principle of speed is not an unprepared blind encounter, and I hope that all the leaders will follow the specific arrangements of Commander Ye and carry them out quickly and resolutely, so as to complete the task of annihilating the Yellow Corps tomorrow night." ”
According to the predetermined battle plan, our army quickly annihilated the headquarters of the 16th Brigade and two regiments of the 75th Division, while the main force attacked the enemy's Yellow Corps on all fronts while the enemy's Yellow Corps was attacking us. At dawn on the fourth day, our army annihilated two regiments of the Yellow Corps and compressed it in more than ten villages in Diqiudian and its periphery. On the 5th, the enemy infantry, guided by tanks and supported by aircraft and artillery fire, carried out a frantic counterattack on the attacking troops near Diqiudian.
In particular, the position of the 7th Regiment of the 3rd Division of the 1st Column of our Chai Qi was wantonly and indiscriminately bombed by the enemy, and the tanks and infantry jointly attacked and fought fiercely for seven hours, and the position remained unmoved. After I inflict a lot of damage on the enemy, knock them back. After dusk, I launched another attack on the enemy, and by the morning of the 6th, a column captured Wang Laoji, and completely annihilated all the other two companies of the 324th Regiment of the 25th Division defending the enemy. The rest of the verticals have made progress. Huang Baitao was forced to shrink his troops to a small area centered on Diqiudian.
The attack on the night of 5 July was very crucial, and our attacking troops did not complete the plan to clear the perimeter of Diqiudian, so it was impossible to plan a general attack on Diqiudian on the 6th. If the task of clearing the periphery is completed, most of the living forces of the Yellow Corps will be annihilated, and only two columns of troops will need to be used in the general attack, while the rest of the troops can concentrate their forces to send reinforcements, and the task of completely annihilating the Yellow Corps can also be achieved. Since the general offensive had to be postponed until the evening of the 7th, the enemy's reinforcements were approaching, which would put our troops on the back foot. At this time, the enemy's situation had changed, the enemy's reorganized Fifth Army had already threatened our army's flank from Qixian to the northeast, the vanguard of the reorganized 18th Army had already reached Huaiyang, and the next day it could reach Taikang, and the artillery would be able to hit our back. The enemy's reorganized 74th Division (rebuilt after being annihilated) has also reached the northeast of Ningling. The head of Noji decisively decided to take advantage of the victory to withdraw his troops. The battle ended with the victory of destroying more than 50,000 enemies (together with the battle of conquering Kaifeng, a total of 90,000 enemies were destroyed).
The battle of Suiqi was fought very hard and very hard. The troops fought continuously, the consumption gradually increased, the formation was incomplete, and the number of soldiers was insufficient. In addition to the fact that there was no rain for a long time in the war zone, the wells and rivers dried up, the summer was awakened, the scorching sun was exposed, and the physical strength was gradually weakened, the commanders and fighters overcame many difficulties with amazing perseverance. Victory is not easy to come by!However, this victory brought about a great change in the situation in the Central Plains, and the enemy completely lost the initiative on the battlefield. This played a great role in enabling our army to conduct a strategic decisive battle with the enemy in the future.
On 11 July, ** sent a congratulatory message to all the commanders and fighters of the People's Liberation Army in East China and the Central Plains: "Celebrate your great victory in annihilating 50,000 people in Jiang's enemy area, such as the Shounian Corps and Huang Baitao Corps, in eastern Henan after the victory in Kaifeng. "This brilliant victory is giving Chiang Kai-shek's voice of 'purging the Central Plains' a head-on blow;At the same time, it is also enabling our army to enter the third year of the Chinese People's Liberation War more favorably. In this summer, I would like to express my condolences to the comrades. ”
Like the commanders and fighters, I read this congratulatory message with the joy of victory and greeted with confidence the arrival of the new year of the Liberation War.