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In 1947, the Northeast Field Army of the People's Liberation Army launched three large-scale offensive operations in summer, autumn and winter, annihilating more than 38 Kuomintang troops, controlling 97 of the land and 86 percent of the population of Northeast China, and rapidly expanding its troops, and by the eve of the Liaoshen Campaign in August 1948, it had expanded to 54 divisions of 700,000 people, including 12 infantry columns, 1 artillery column, 1 railway column, 15 independent divisions and 3 cavalry divisions, and 330,000 local troops cooperated in the operation.
The first battle of the Northeast Decisive Battle was selected in Yixian
On the other hand, the Kuomintang army had only more than 550,000 troops left in the northeast, and most of its troops were inadequately established, short of equipment, and short of food and ammunition. In such a situation, the prelude to the decisive battle between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party has become inevitable in the northeast, and the place of the first battle may be Jinzhou, which is located at the junction of Hebei, Re, and Liaoning provinces, and holds the western Liaoning corridor that retreats to the Guannei.
The place of the first battle in Jinzhou must be Yixian, 100 miles north of the city, which is known as the "North Gate" of Jinzhou, and is also a barrier to cover the security of northern Jinzhou and along the Bac Ninh Railway. If the main force of the Northeast Field Army, which gathers in Jilin and Heilongjiang provinces, wants to attack Jinzhou, it must first take here, and once the situation improves, it can use Yixian as a base to attack Chengde and Chifeng to the west, and threaten Fuxin and Zhangwu in the north. In order to ensure this point, as early as March 1948, the 20th Division of the 93rd Army of the Kuomintang Army was sent to Yixian County to be responsible for defense.
Semi-American miscellaneous cards are in charge of defense
The 93rd Army was formed during the Anti-Japanese War by the "King of Yunnan" Long Yun to integrate the local troops of the province, experienced the test of the Anti-Japanese War, and was later incorporated into the second phase of the Chinese Expeditionary Force, replaced with American-style equipment, and the 20th Division was temporarily organized as the main force of the army, under the jurisdiction of 3 regiments, and was also equipped with mountain artillery battalions, engineer battalions, baggage battalions, communication companies, special service companies, etc., a total of 8,000 guns, quite combat effectiveness. In March 1948, when the division was stationed in Yixian, the area around western Liaoning was still relatively calm, and the railways leading to the ports of Guannai and Huludao were still unimpeded, so the whole division, from the division commander Wang Shigao to the junior officers, maintained an optimistic mood.
In the eyes of Wang Shigao and others, although Yixian is at the forefront of the Northeast Battlefield, it is not isolated, and there are 100,000 heavy troops stationed in Jinzhou behind it, as well as Huludao Port to supply equipment and food at any time, plus the air force that can fly from Shenyang at any time, the defense is quite certain. What's more, Yixian is surrounded by an ancient brick and stone city wall with a height of 10 meters and a width of 4 meters, with the Daling River in the north, and the other three sides are flat alluvial plains, with a wide field of vision, which is convenient for the defenders to strafe condescendingly.
The defenders build a three-dimensional defensive position
After the provisional 20th Division was stationed in Yixian, it redrew up a plan to comprehensively strengthen the fortifications, strengthened the core position on the basis of the old city wall, and strengthened and built many company strongholds outside the city, consisting of more than three bunker groups, and connected them with communication trenches in the middle. Outside the bunker group is an outer trench with a width of 3 meters and a depth of 3 meters, and in front of the outer trench is set up with deer barricades and barbed wire fences of more than 3 meters as obstacles.
On the periphery of this defensive zone, the defenders relied on the villages to build and renovate a large number of advance strongholds, not only the firepower of the strongholds and strongholds could be crossed, but also the firepower on the city walls could also be supported, forming a vast and deep three-dimensional fire network. Even if a stronghold is breached, the strongholds on the left, right, and rear flanks can be left unaffected, and flank fire can be used to annihilate the intruding troops.
With such a complete defense system, division commander Wang Shigao thought that there would be no problem in holding it for at least one month, and for this reason, he also specially held a military parade ceremony and invited army commander Sheng Jiaxing to come to the scene to review the garrison and the security regiment to cheer everyone up. At the end of September 1949, the 3rd Column of the Northeast Field Army and other troops in Linyi County, quickly cleared the perimeter and repelled the Jinzhou reinforcements, launched a general attack at 9:30 on October 1, and at 13:30 in the afternoon, more than 12,000 people defending the city were annihilated, and Wang Shigao, the commander of the city defense and the commander of the 20th Division of the provisional formation, was captured, and it took only 4 hours before and after.