years, against the fight against Vietnam, ** worries dispelled.
1.Three wars: the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, the Sino-Indian Self-Defense Counterattack War, and the Sino-Vietnamese Self-Defense Counterattack War.
The War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea was the invasion of neighboring countries, and when the decision was made, most of the leaders opposed sending troops to North Korea, **supported it themselves, **hesitated at first, and later clearly supported it.
2.In the three wars, the Sino-Indian self-defense counterattack, and the Sino-Vietnamese self-defense counterattack, there was no opposition to the Sino-Indian self-defense counterattack when making decisions, and the high-level consensus was that it was a battle that must be fought.
The War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea was the invasion of neighboring countries, and the majority of the leadership opposed sending troops to North Korea at the time of decision-making, **firmly supported,** hesitated at first, but later clearly supported it.
In the decision-making process of the Sino-Vietnamese self-defense counterattack, many opposing voices sounded, and even Su Yu, then Minister of National Defense and member of the Military Commission, had doubts about Comrade ***'s decision.
However, it was Comrade **'s words that finally helped Comrade *** to make up his mind. In the eyes of many people, Su Yu belongs to the people's army"God of War"The old marshal also has profound military attainments, and their opposition has important weight.
The reason for the comrade to fight did not cause much dissent from the leadership, but the problem is that there is a huge risk of going to war. And Comrade **'s words are the key to resolving this risk.
In China's bilateral relationship with Vietnam, the risk of China engaging in a war of self-defense and counterattack was relatively small, and the war was urgent at the time. Before the founding of the People's Republic of China, China gave strong support to Vietnam's national independence movement, for example, after the end of the War of Resistance Against Japan, the Chinese Expeditionary Force successfully prevented the landing of French troops in northern Vietnam, buying more time for Vietnam's national independence forces.
As New China's assistance to Vietnam continued to intensify, this assistance was not only based on the needs of national interests, but also reflected the common ideals of the socialist camp. China played an important supporting role in the Battle of Dien Bien Phu, which decided Vietnam's independence.
The timing of the battle coincided with the signing of the Korean Battlefield Armistice, suggesting a close connection between North Korea and Vietnam. If the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea had not been won, even if the Battle of Dien Bien Phu had been a great victory, France would not have signed the Geneva Accords and withdrawn from Vietnam.
Therefore, the necessity of this war of self-defense and counterattack cannot be ignored.
During the Geneva Conference, China sent a military advisory mission to Vietnam, headed by General Wei Guoqing. They drew up a campaign plan and submitted the report directly to *** and Su Yu in Beijing.
Vietnam has drawn up a list of supplies according to its own needs, and China has done its best to provide assistance, even transport, including bicycles. During Vietnam's resistance to France and the United States, China gave huge material and financial assistance, totaling $20 billion, which was a huge amount for China at that time.
In addition, China sent engineering and air defense units, and more than a thousand Chinese died on Vietnamese soil for the freedom of Vietnam.
Our support for Vietnam was a turning point in the war, without which the Vietnam War might not have lasted so long. At the same time, our country has never been arrogant because of its help to Vietnam, nor has it pointed fingers at Vietnam, so why would Vietnam choose to be our enemy?
Vietnam is hostile to our country because we have prevented it from pursuing its hegemonic ambitions. At the same time, Vietnam's ambitions echoed those of the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union and Vietnam's attempt to join forces for hegemony is the main reason for China's self-defense counterattack between China and Vietnam, and it is also the biggest risk among them.
In 1965, after Leonid Brezhnev came to power, the Soviet Union changed its strategy of "peaceful competition" with the United States, taking advantage of the fact that the United States was deeply involved in the Vietnam War, on the one hand, increasing aid to Vietnam to contain the United States, and on the other hand, actively expanding in the Soviet-American struggle for hegemony, forcing the United States to adopt a defensive posture.
During the time of Brezhnev's rule, there were pro-Soviet factions in North Vietnam who told our country that they did not believe that the Soviet Union had betrayed North Vietnam. Ho Chi Minh was wise in this regard, knowing that our country is the real ally that Vietnam can rely on.
When Vo Nguyen Gia suggested replacing the Chinese model with the Soviet one, Ho Chi Minh suspended him from his post and did a deep reflection until he realized his mistake and did not reinstate his position.
In 1969, Ho Chi Minh's illness worsened, and the pro-Soviet faction, which was already in power at that time, abandoned us by negotiating with the United States and our country together with the Soviet Union. At that time, the chief of our country said that my country was outraged by this betrayal and told North Vietnam that the talks between the two parties could no longer proceed.
The original intention of the pro-Soviet faction in Ho Chi Minh was not only to receive assistance from the Soviet Union, even if the Soviet Union increased its assistance to North Vietnam, our country's assistance to North Vietnam was no less than that of the Soviet Union.
The pro-Soviet faction leaned towards the Soviet Union because of their ambitions to unify Indochina by annexing Laos, Cambodia, Burma, and even Thailand after the reunification of Vietnam.
My country, which is committed to peace, would not agree to such a plan. The Soviet Union, on the other hand, was very supportive of North Vietnam's attempt to help it realize its plan, so that the Soviet Union could expand its influence throughout the Pacific Ocean and at the same time form a north-south attack on our country.
After Ho Chi Minh's death, all the rational pro-Chinese factions in North Vietnam were ostracized, and the pro-Soviet faction began to dominate, which deepened the estrangement between North Vietnam and our country.
After the reunification of Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh did not focus on national reconstruction, but deliberately sought hegemony. In 1977, when Le Duan visited China, the relationship between China and Vietnam faced a huge challenge.
During the talks with Comrade Xiaoping, Le Duan put forward a list of assistance and asked our country to meet the needs of Vietnam on the list in order to repair Sino-Vietnamese relations. However, the equipment requested in this list far exceeds Vietnam's defense needs and is sufficient to wage a war against the entire Indochina Peninsula.
Since 1974, Vietnam has been creating incidents on the Sino-Vietnamese border, and even after the reunification of the north and the south, the frequency of attacks on China's Guangxi and Yunnan borders has not slowed down, but has inherited South Vietnam's sovereignty claim over China's Xisha Islands, and Sino-Vietnamese relations have further deteriorated.
Li Duan held the ** aid list to talk about repairing relations, with a tough attitude and no sincerity. Comrade Xiaoping will not meet his demands, even if he has a good attitude. The ** on the list to Vietnam is undoubtedly a tiger breeding, the Vietnam War has ended, these ** will not only disturb the situation around our country, but will also be used by Vietnam to attack our country.
It is impossible for our country to become such a wrongdoer.
In 1978, Vietnam's incursions into China's border areas intensified, resulting in more than 1,000 bloody clashes and the lives of more than 200 of our soldiers and border residents.
Many border residents were forced to abandon their farmland and leave their homes because of Vietnamese artillery fire. The reason why Vietnam dared to provoke China was because it had formed an alliance with the Soviet Union, and this kind of behavior was actually a show of goodwill and loyalty to the Soviet Union.
In response to Vietnam's provocations, our country will not sit idly by. At that time, our country planned to send three divisions of troops to conduct self-defense operations in order to teach Vietnam a lesson and make it converge.
However, before this plan could be implemented, Vietnam signed a military alliance treaty with the Soviet Union and sent troops to occupy Cambodia, taking the first step towards the creation of an Indochinese federation.
In the face of Vietnam's momentum of expansion, Comrade Xiaoping put forward a strategy of not only self-defense, but also counterattack. According to this conception, the scale of the war would exceed expectations, and it would even require deep penetration into Vietnamese territory.
Only in this way can we effectively contain Vietnam's reckless militarism and prevent it from establishing hegemony in the Indochina Peninsula. If Vietnam succeeds in gaining hegemony, China will face the Soviet Union's north-south attack, the Sino-Vietnamese border will be difficult to tranquil, the southeast coast will also be threatened, and even the energy channel may be blocked, national defense will be under tremendous pressure, and economic construction will also be difficult.
However, if we act according to Comrade Xiaoping's ideas, we will face enormous risks. The USSR and Vietnam had formed a military alliance, Vietnam was attacked, and the USSR was obliged to send troops to the war.
If our country is forced to fight on two fronts, the advanced ** and strong strength of the Soviet army will put us at a disadvantage, especially since their troops stationed in Mongolia are only five hundred kilometers from Beijing, which will pose a serious threat to our country.
At the meeting to discuss the self-defense and counterattack war against Vietnam, Comrade Xiaoping's objections mainly focused on two points: First, China has just shifted the focus of its work to economic construction, and it is not appropriate for large-scale military action.
Second, they are worried that the Soviet Union may intervene in the war and it will be difficult to control the scale of the war. The concern of the Soviet Union sending troops was the main reason for the opponents, and the old marshal and Su Yu did not support the self-defense counterattack, which was also due to this concern.
Although Comrade Xiaoping also shared this concern, he advocated at the meeting that we should discuss as many possible situations as possible and formulate corresponding countermeasures to deal with them. In the face of many opposing voices, Comrade Xiaoping did not immediately make a decision, but asked Comrade ** to share his views on the war of self-defense and counterattack.
Seniority is old, prestige is high. As early as 1931, they served as members of the Politburo. In the field of finance and economics, they made an important contribution to the stable development during the war period and after the founding of the state.
When *** returned to leadership positions, they formed a "twin peaks" with ***, and their opinions were highly influential. Although he had never personally commanded an army, his years of experience in the struggle had given him a unique insight into complex situations.
When asked about the possibility of the Soviet Union sending troops, he made a suggestion of a "quick fix", which coincided with ***'s idea. In addition, our country is a nuclear power, and in 1971 it was restored to its rightful seat in the United Nations, becoming a permanent member of the Security Council, and the status of a great power did not allow the Soviet Union to act rashly.
* Comrades believe that the Soviet Union has been feared by our military strength and determination to defend our sovereignty, and that we should seize this advantage and quickly and decisively launch a war of self-defense and counterattack against Vietnam.
He pointed out that the Soviet Union had a powerful adversary such as the United States, and if it fell into a war with us, not only would it not be able to reap the benefits of helping Vietnam, but on the contrary, it would lose its superiority in the Soviet-American struggle for hegemony and even threaten its national capital.
Therefore, even if there was a treaty of military alliance, the USSR would not immediately send troops to Vietnam. This judgment has given us the opportunity to make a quick decision, and it has also dispelled many people's worries.
At the suggestion of Comrade **, Comrade Xiaoping firmly decided to carry out a Sino-Vietnamese self-defense counterattack and formulated a strategy of "limited scale, limited time, and limited space", so that the opinions of the leadership could be unified.
Under the leadership of Comrade Xiaoping, China adopted a series of diplomatic measures, the most important of which was to ensure that the Soviet Union would not interfere in China's affairs. In 1978, Vietnam signed a military alliance treaty with the Soviet Union, which made it possible for China and the United States to establish diplomatic relations.
Although Vietnam had expressed dissatisfaction with China's approach, believing that China had sacrificed Vietnam's interests, facts have proved that the improvement of Sino-US relations has given the United States a pretext to withdraw from the Vietnam War and created conditions for Vietnam's reunification.
At the same time, the alliance between the Soviet Union and Vietnam posed a threat to the security of Indochina, prompting China and the United States to accelerate the pace of establishing diplomatic relations to jointly prevent the expansion of the Soviet Union and Vietnam in the Indochina Peninsula.
At the same time as Nixon's visit to China to promote the establishment of diplomatic relations between the United States and China and the containment of the Soviet Union-Vietnam alliance, in November 1978, when the Soviet Union and Vietnam formed an alliance, Comrade ** visited Singapore.
In his meeting with Lee Kuan Yew, he exposed Vietnam's ambitions: Vietnam completely turned to the Soviet Union and tried to establish a federation of Indochina, which China firmly opposed. At this time, Comrade ** is enlisting the support of the international community for self-defense and counterattack.
On January 29, 1979, Comrade ** visited the United States, during which he repeatedly announced to the international community that China might launch a self-defense counterattack against Vietnam.
In his speech, Comrade Kodaira stressed the importance of pursuing suddenness in preparing for war, but he nevertheless announced our intentions in advance in order to gain the status of a famous division and to stop the reckless movement of the Soviet Union between the false and the real.
In the Sino-Vietnamese self-defense counterattack, China mobilized nine armies and 500,000 troops, and although it was in the satellite era, it was difficult to avoid being reported for the sake of secrecy. However, during Comrade Xiaoping's visit to the United States, both the United States and the Soviet Union's TASS news agency reported the news that our ** team had assembled on the Sino-Vietnamese border.
As a matter of fact, our intentions in conducting a Sino-Vietnamese self-defense counterattack do not need to be kept secret, but we need to publicly state and explain the reasons in order to win support.
When Comrade Xiaoping enjoys broad support in the United States and the international community, the more likely it is that the Soviet Union will choose not to send troops rashly, and the more legitimate China's self-defense counterattack will be. During his meeting with the then US ** Carter, Comrade Xiaoping made it clear that China would stand shoulder to shoulder with Cambodia to resist Vietnam's aggression.
"In order to maintain international peace and long-term stability, we will firmly fulfill our internationalist obligations, even if it requires the necessary sacrifices," he said. "At the subsequent press conference, Comrade Xiaoping publicly announced that our country may launch a self-defense counterattack against Vietnam.
In his speech to the US Congress, he more directly criticized the hegemonic aggression of the Soviet Union and stressed that the United States should shoulder its responsibility to prevent such acts.
When Comrade Xiaoping visited the United States and Vietnam to launch a war of aggression, he gathered international forces to support our country in carrying out a self-defense counterattack, and the Soviet Union would face more concerns if it wanted to send troops to help Vietnam.
On his way back from his visit to the United States, when Comrade Xiaoping met with the leaders of Japan and Singapore, he once again made it clear that China would launch a self-defense counterattack against Vietnam. The Sino-Vietnamese self-defense counterattack began on February 17, 1979, and was scheduled to end within half a month.
At that time, the high-latitude Sino-Soviet border region was still cold, which further reduced the likelihood of the Soviet Union sending troops. Before the war, our army carried out careful precautions on the Sino-Soviet border and evacuated 300,000 border residents from the Xinjiang border.
The Air Force and Navy did not participate in the war of self-defense and counterattack, but went all out to alert the Soviet forces and limit the scale of the war. After the start of the war, the operation on the Western Front under the commander-in-chief of Yang Dezhi went smoothly, and within the scheduled time, a series of achievements were achieved, such as occupying Lao Cai, the capital city of the border province, and defeating the 316A Division, the main force of the Vietnamese army.
After occupying Cao Binh, Commander-in-Chief Xu Shiyou believed that the results of the Eastern Front were insufficient, and submitted a request to the Military Commission, hoping to continue the attack on Lang Son City, an important barrier in Hanoi. In order to ensure the smooth operation of the operation, the troops of the Eastern Front waited for two days in order for our intelligence services to determine the movement of Soviet troops.
After confirming that the Soviet army showed no signs of sending troops, the Eastern Front launched the Battle of Lang Son, which successfully captured Lang Son and caused a shock in Hanoi. This operation not only caused the evacuation of Vietnam's most important departments, but also caused Hanoi's foreign diplomats to leave Hanoi one after another.
Due to the outstanding performance of our army in the Battle of Lang Son, the ** Military Commission decided to withdraw from the Vietnamese mainland. On 16 March, our country announced the withdrawal of its troops from Vietnam, ending a short but intense course of war.
Although Hsu Shihu's self-defense counterattack did not force Vietnam to withdraw its troops from Cambodia, it did allow it to deploy a million troops on the Sino-Vietnamese border, unable to continue to expand, and the economy was facing collapse in preparation for war.
At the same time, the failure of the Soviet Union to send troops to aid Vietnam undermined its international prestige, leading to a tendency to secede in Afghanistan, bogging the Soviet Union into the quagmire of the Afghan war, which eventually led to the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Therefore, whether the war of self-defense and counterattack should be fought is a question worthy of in-depth discussion. The leadership made deliberate decisions at that time, operated them properly, and ultimately won an environment for our country to develop peacefully in the long term.