After the battle of Mengzi, the enemy army in Yunnan fell into a panic. The remnants of the enemy's 26th Army fled to Gejiu, and the fleeing enemy 8th Corps Headquarters and the 8th Army retreated to the southwest in the direction of the Yuanjiang River after opening the distance.
In order to seize the fighter and not give the enemy a chance to breathe, Chen Geng ordered Zhou Xihan to lead the 13th Army to quickly catch up, with the 37th Division as the main body, and pursue it in three directions. In the course of pursuit, our army resolutely implemented the tactical thinking of "pursuing and striking fiercely, pursuing to the end, and not stopping until annihilation" and displayed an indomitable fighting spirit.
Our army was divided into three lines, directed at the enemy. The central route was personally led by Zhou Xihan, and marched westward along the Jasper Railway, with the main force controlling Mengzi Airport, with the goal of Jianshui and Shiping; On the left side, the main forces of the 114th Division and the 151st Division led by Liang Xingchu advanced northwest along the Red River, overcoming many difficulties and obstacles, and intercepting the enemy head-on, while the other force controlled Jinping; On the right road, the Guizhou-Yunnan-Guizhou border is a longitudinal one, day and night, from northern Yunnan, along the way through the Asan to the Mojiang River, intercepting the fleeing enemy.
The three-way army was like a net of heaven and earth, encircling the enemy army. Our army gives full play to the enthusiasm, initiative, and arbitrariness of commanders at all levels, does not fear to stay away from the main force, dares to win more with less, is not confused or obstructed by a small number of enemies, quickly grasps the enemy's main force, and boldly wedges the enemy in depth to carry out a roundabout encirclement.
On January 17, 1950, the two regiments of the 37th Division of the Middle Road, led by Deputy Division Commander Wu Xiaomin, launched a fierce pursuit of Gejiu. At dawn, the 110th Battalion of the 2nd Regiment successfully annihilated the enemy and cut off the enemy's retreat to Jianshui.
The 5th Company launched an attack on the city, squeezing the enemy forces inside the city; The 1st Battalion attacked from the north gate of the city, the 3rd Battalion from the northwest of the city, and the 2nd Battalion from the southeast of the city, and after two hours of fierce fighting, successfully occupied the entire old city and captured more than 3,000 enemies.
Immediately afterwards, the regiment quickly crossed the Red River and arrived in the Wabi Tusi area. At the same time, another unit of the 37th Division successfully annihilated the remnants of the enemy's 161st, 173rd, and 93rd Divisions, as well as one of the 20th Army, near Jijie.
At 15 o'clock on the 18th, the 110th Regiment encountered the 577th Regiment of the enemy's 8th Army in Puxiong, and after a fierce attack by our army, the enemy's deputy regiment commander led the regiment and a battalion with a total of 300 soldiers to surrender.
On the 20th, the division entered and occupied Jianshui and Shiping, and controlled the entire line of the Jasper Railway. The remnants of the enemy had long since been crushed after suffering heavy losses. On the mountain road from Shiping to Yuanjiang, there are guns, documents, mules and horses, and wounded men abandoned by the enemy.
In the battle of exhaustively chasing the fleeing enemy, our troops showed incomparable bravery and tenacity. On the 18th, when the main force of our army was pursuing Jianshui and Shiping, the 237th Division of the enemy's 26th Army tried to escape from Puxiong to Hebang Ferry.
On the 19th, the 3rd Platoon of the 5th Company of the 113th Regiment of the 38th Division, under the command of Guo Chunsheng, a young combat hero and platoon commander, successfully seized the Nidekle Mountain. With the strength of one platoon, this platoon stubbornly intercepted the frantic attack of a fleeing enemy division.
Guo Chunsheng led his platoon, fearless in the face of the enemy's fierce attack, insisted on holding his position, and showed a tenacious fighting spirit. With his wise and courageous actions, he successfully thwarted many enemy attacks and saved our positions.
His heroic deeds won the praise of the Party Committee of the 13th Army, and he was awarded the title of "Guo Chunsheng Heroic Platoon that Can Attack and Defend, Solid as Steel", and became a young combat hero.
In this battle, only one platoon of our army bravely blocked the fleeing enemy, plus the 3rd battalion rushed to counterattack, killing and wounding more than 230 enemies, capturing more than 270 enemies, capturing 15 mortars, 31 machine guns, more than 350 long and short guns, and capturing more than 300 mules and horses.
This battle not only demonstrated the bravery and determination of our army, but also proved that only unity can overcome any difficulties.
Our troops on the right flank, Guizhou, Yunnan, and Guizhou were in the direction of Mojiang and Zhenyuan to block the fleeing enemy. Tian Zhongda, deputy commander of the enemy's 8th Army and commander of the 3rd Division in the northwest area of Shiping, led more than 2,000 troops to surrender to our border column.
The 114th and 151st Divisions of our left troops attacked and annihilated the enemy's 193rd Division at Agumi and Lengshuigou, capturing 580 enemy personnel, pursued and annihilated the enemy's 93rd Division at Lanjiaoba, captured Yide, and annihilated all the enemy's 237th Division headquarters and two regiments, capturing more than 1,900 enemies.
On the 20th, the 37th Division of the Central Route Army intercepted more than 1,700 fleeing enemies at Yingpanshan east of the Yuanjiang River. Zhou Xihan led the main force of the middle pursuit force to the mountainous area southwest of Tongpu on Yuanjiang Road, and the remnants of the enemy were cut into two sections, and most of the enemies hid in Sanjiacun and Yutai Mountain and did not dare to move.
At night, artillery shells rang out over Sanjia Village, and the sound of our soldiers shouting "surrender the guns" echoed in every corner. Under the orders of our troops, the sloppy enemy troops came out of different corners and bowed their heads in embarrassment.
The enemy troops of all formations fled and the enemy tamely laid down ** on our army.
The remnants of the enemy led by the leader of the enemy army, Cao Tiange, took advantage of the chaos to flee to the Yuanjiang Chain Bridge. But there was no way out, and the 6th Company of the 2nd Battalion of a certain regiment of our army crossed the mountains and defeated the engineer battalion sent by Cao Tiange.
The bridge was destroyed, and the remnants of the defeated army could not escape, so they had to be captured. On the 23rd, Division Commander Zhou Xueyi commanded the 110th Regiment, the 114th Regiment and the 1st Border Column of our 37th Division to encircle the enemy's 8th Corps Headquarters, the 8th Army Headquarters and the 42nd Division led by Tang Yao in the Hongtupo and Ertang areas.
In order to completely annihilate the enemy, at dawn on the 24th, the 109th Regiment attacked from the northwest, the 110th Regiment from the east, and the 114th Regiment from the south. Tang Yao, commander of the enemy regiment, and Cao Tiange, commander of the army, organized counterattacks many times in order to save the fate of annihilation, but they were all repelled by us.
Zhou Xueyi ordered all units to take advantage of the victory to carry out interspersed division against the enemy, and each regiment, battalion, and company was like a sharp knife, penetrating directly into the enemy's depth, and the battle was extremely fierce. By 14 o'clock, except for the enemy's 170th Division, which fled westward across the Red River from the chain bridge on the north side of the Yuanjiang River, the enemy's 8th Corps Headquarters and 8th Army Headquarters were all annihilated by us.
The scene of the remnants of the bandits that day was extremely embarrassing: the enemy instructors who were chased by our 109th Regiment from Yingpanshan to the east bank of the Yuan River saw that the river was surging and the escape route was cut off, so they had to flock together and wait to surrender.
A group of enemy soldiers who tried in vain to escape from the mouth of the Yutai Mountain were captured one by one by the warriors guarding the mouth of the ditch by our 8th Company. The enemy soldiers who were in the cracks of the rocks, in the grass nests, and in the puddles were all caught one by one.
The enemy's 42nd Division and the headquarters of the 8th Army, which retreated to a ditch south of the Red Clay Slope, were captured by 20 fighters of two squads of our 6th Company, 880 of whom were captured in one go, and 42 light and heavy machine guns and 19 mountain artillery pieces and six artillery pieces were also captured.
A group of enemies led by Cao Tiange, commander of the enemy's 8th Army, was fleeing in the ditch, and was discovered by our troops pursuing on the cliff of the ditch.
Like Tang Yao, Cao Tiange was also one of the main culprits in sabotaging the peaceful liberation of Yunnan. After being captured, he pleaded for mercy, but in fact, Cao Tiange, who had been detained by Li Mi a month earlier, had not only refused to revolt, but also sabotaged the peaceful liberation of Yunnan.
In the "operational review" of the attack on Kunming, Cao Tiange personally wrote: "The reason why this operation was not completely won was due to the poor cooperation of friendly forces......”
On January 23, the 2nd Battalion and 6th Company of a certain regiment, which was brave and fearless, launched a fierce attack on the enemy troops occupying a high mountain south of the Red Clay Slope in the Battle of the Yuanjiang Iron Bridge.
With dozens of machine guns, mortars, and anti-aircraft guns, the enemy frantically poured artillery fire down the mountain. However, that didn't stop the Warriors from moving forward. Although the company commander Zhang Haihai and the deputy of the 1st platoon Pan Zhenggang died one after another, and the squad leader Yu Liantang was wounded twice, they still insisted on moving forward and constantly attacked the mountain.
Eventually, the enemy forces were repulsed and forced to retreat to a group of small hills below the high mountains. And on the same day, the 6th Company also successfully repelled several counterattacks by more than 1,000 enemy troops.
At dawn on the 24th, a huge encirclement and annihilation battle unfolded on various hills. To the west of the red clay slope was a column of cliffs and mountains, so our troops only launched attacks in the east, south, and west directions, gradually narrowing the encirclement and forcing the remnants of the enemy into a desperate situation.
After the heavy gunfire subsided, a ravine immediately south of the red clay slope was littered with the corpses of the remnants of the enemy, the end of their refusal to surrender. Next, more than 1,000 remnants of soldiers, carrying various **, including two chemical warfare defense guns, 11 mortars, 32 six-cannon guns, 73 light and heavy machine guns and hundreds of long and short guns, were captured by our army and guided to the designated place.
In this battle, Tang Yao, the supreme commander of the enemy in Yunnan, the deputy commander of the "General Lu", was also captured.
In the ravine where Tang Yao was captured alive, more than 800 enemies were hidden. At this time, 8 fighters of the 1st company of a certain regiment of our army rushed forward. They shouted "Don't move!"
Surrender your guns! More than 800 soldiers did not resist, but breathed a sigh of relief. They all put their guns on the ground and shouted, "I didn't want to fight for a long time!" "A soldier who surrendered told me that the soldier next to him was Tang Yao.
When the soldier went over to ask, Tang Yao's face changed, and his voice trembled and said, "Yes, I am Tang Yao, the deputy commander of the army!" Then, Tang Yao actually pretended to cry.
On the battlefield of the Liberation War, the captured enemy's senior generals had various performances, but Tang Yao belonged to another kind. As soon as he saw the company commander of our army, he pretended to be calm, and said that he was a person who could not be eaten and was useless, and that he had just become a "deputy commander-in-chief" and a prisoner, and that he had fallen into the trap of Gu Zhutong and had become a "ghost for the dead", and he also sarcastically said with a hippie smile that he was a "prisoner sent by a plane".
When he rushed back to southern Yunnan by plane from Taiwan Island, Chiang originally asked him to be responsible for airlifting the 26th Army to Taiwan Island, and he commanded the 8th Army to "hold on" in western Yunnan. However, by the time he flew back here, it was too late, not only did the 26th Army not transport it, but the 8th Army did not "insist", and even he himself got in.
After he was captured, only more than 3,000 remnants of the 170th Division of the newly patched 8th Corps ran across the Yuanjiang River, and after crossing the Red River, they fled lifelessly towards the border in the direction of Zhenyuan.
At the forefront was the strength of about two regiments of our heroic 13th Army Division, led by Deputy Division Commander Wu Xiaomin, who crossed the mountains, chased the Yuanjiang River, chased the Mojiang County, chased the Amo River, and chased the Jiangbian River ......Overcoming all difficulties, after eight days and nights of continuous pursuit, the pursuit reached February 6, and finally the fleeing enemy was restrained and surrounded in the Zhibanjing area, more than 80 miles west of Zhenyuan.
In the face of the enemy's dying throes, our troops heroically intercepted and continuously repelled the enemy's attempts to break through. At the critical moment, the Guizhou-Yunnan-Guizhou border column troops were urgently reinforced, and our army grew rapidly and launched a political offensive.
In the face of the desperate remnants of the enemy, our army finally won the victory, and the enemy division commander He Jinxian led more than 2,400 troops to surrender to our army. After the prisoners were handed over to the border column, the pursuing troops continued to advance under the leadership of Wu Xiaomin.
In Pu'er, it was learned that the remnants of the 278th Regiment of the enemy's 26th Army were fleeing southward, and in order to annihilate the remnants of the bandits, Wu Xiaomin concentrated the existing personnel and equipment, personally led the 114th Regiment and 5 companies, and tailed the enemy southward.
Between the Ailao Mountain and the Lancang River, they slept in the open air, trekked through mountains and rivers, marched 150 miles a day, and pursued them all the way to Nanjiao on the national border, and finally caught this group of remnant enemies.
In the fierce battle on February 19, our army won a complete victory, captured more than 500 people, liberated the key border areas of Xishuangbanna - Cheli, Fohai and Nanjiao, and finally fought all the way to Taluo, an important town on the border between China and Myanmar.
The dust of the Battle of Southern Yunnan settled, and all the remnants of the bandits were annihilated, creating a miracle of pursuit warfare in the history of world land warfare. Our army's No. 2 field, No. 4 field, and Guizhou-Yunnan-Guizhou border column units fought side by side, shattering the illusion that the remnants of the bandits would break through the encirclement and escape.
After large and small battles, more than 23,100 officers and soldiers of Jiang were captured, including Tang Yao, Cao Tiange and other general-level officers. Tang Yao, the last general of the enemy army in the Southern Yunnan Campaign, was captured with the rank of deputy commander-in-chief of the Chiang army, and he shouted to see Chen Geng because he remembered his former identity as a Whampoa weapons instructor.
Although Chen Geng is a man of temperament, he does not have much affection for this teacher. Tang Yao spent the rest of his life in the war criminals management center, where he finally died of illness.
Tang Yao Li Mi, with the fortunate experience of two desperate situations, became the best among them. But over time, he and his troops got bogged down.
On Taiwan Island, in order to survive, they cooperated with the armed forces to smuggle drugs, which brought great harm to the local area. Although Li Mi died of illness in 1973, his remnants and the chaos he brought remained in.
They once captured 4 counties in Yunnan in a row, but under the siege of our ** team, they were finally defeated and retreated to Myanmar again. However, the scourge they left behind in the Golden Triangle cannot be erased.