The beacon of youth

The strange deployment of Hu Zongnan and Ma's army gave the party committee of the field army an opportunity to gather and annihilate the enemy, and made up their minds to encircle and suppress Hu Zongnan's Central Army first.

When Boss Peng made this decision at the senior cadre meeting of the Field Army, the entire venue became active. These senior commanders who came to the meeting understood that the intention of the Field Army was obvious, and that was to attack Hu Zongnan's Central Army first.

Boss Peng pressed his hands a few times to calm everyone down: "But, comrades, we can't underestimate the enemy. The enemy's total strength is still three to 10,000+, which is not much less than ours. Even if we deal with Hu Zongnan's Central Army alone It's not easy, the enemy doesn't belong to Zhihu, if we want to defeat the enemy, we have to suffer a lot and work hard. Hu Zongnan's five armies are gathered together like hedgehogs, and it is very difficult for us to swallow them in one bite. The battle plan for the first stage is to divide the enemy first, eat the three armies of Hu Zongnan at the first bite, and then see how the situation develops, and now I am announcing the order of the field army."

First, use Yang Dezhi and Li Zhimin's [-]th Corps to restrain the troops of Qing and Ning Ma.

Second, all the main forces of Wang Zhen's First Corps, Xu Guangda's Second Corps, and Zhou Shidi's Eighteenth Corps

A total of nine armies encircled and wiped out Hu Zongnan's Central Army in the Fufeng and Meixian areas.

After the meeting, Boss Peng said to Yang Dezhi and Li Zhimin, the commanders of the [-]th Corps: "The cadres and soldiers worked very hard on the long-distance march, and their physical strength was exhausted. You should be allowed to rest for a while, and it is best to give them a one-month rest period. , But it’s not working now, the horse is about to fight, not to mention the rest time, even the preparation time is very little, although adequate preparation is the basis for victory in the battle, but if you lose the opportunity, even if you are ready, it is useless , when you deal with Erma's army, you must not have the idea of ​​underestimating the enemy, and you must strictly prevent the enemy from sneaking around behind and attacking. This is the usual method of the Ma's army, which is mainly composed of cavalry, and this is what ** wants me to tell you." After finishing speaking, Boss Peng took Send a telegram to Yang Dezhi and Li Zhimin.

This was sent by ** on June 26. The message is as follows: The Yang Corps should move west immediately, approach the two horses to build fortifications, take on the task of containing the Qing and Ning horses, and strictly prevent the two horses from attacking back. This point should be strictly informed Yang Dezhi and Li Zhimin, otherwise they will suffer.

Yang Dezhi and Li Zhimin were very moved. There were so many things waiting for him to make decisions in a day. I didn't expect to mention how to deal with the cavalry in a battle. The two looked at each other and reassured Boss Peng standing in front of him. : "Please rest assured to the Party Committee of the Field Army, please rest assured, our [-]th Corps will definitely complete the task."

At the beginning of July 40, as the [-]th and [-]th Corps of the North China Liberation Army entered the Northwest Battlefield, the total strength of the First Field Army soared to more than [-]. In particular, the railway from Xi'an to Zhengzhou had been repaired and opened to traffic. It has greatly improved the supply of food and ammunition and the transfer of the wounded in the field.

Veterans know that there are three fears when fighting a battle. The first fear is that there will be no food, the second fear is that there will be no ammunition, and the third fear will be that you will not be able to carry it down after being wounded. In order to supply the food, the trains carrying grain drove from Zhengzhou to Xi'an one after another.

Henan is the place where wheat is produced, so most of the supplies that arrived first were flour. The cooks of the old Northwest Field Army almost cried when they saw the flour that had become a train. Good guy, so much flour?How many steamed buns do you have to steam?With steamed buns and bullets, who else are our PLA troops afraid of?

White flour steamed buns can be eaten casually, as much as you can eat, it depends on the capacity of your stomach, the morale of the soldiers of the Northwest Field Army who have been hungry for several years was greatly shaken, and the soldiers whispered to each other in private: "See, this time we don't have anything to eat." There is no shortage, ammunition and food, whatever you want, just concentrate on fighting, naivety is about to change."

The strategic turning point of the Northwest battlefield is about to begin. When the Northwest Field Army was first formed, Boss Peng said that our PLA is not afraid of a decisive battle with the enemy, but a decisive battle at the time and place we have prepared. After more than two years of hard work Fight hard, the day has finally arrived.

On July [-], the Battle of Fufengmei County, which had been brewing for some time, started. The [-]th Corps led by Commander Yang Dezhi was the first to act.

The task of the Ninth Corps is to restrain the Qing and Ning Erma's troops, to ensure that the Erma's troops dare not make big moves when the main force of the field army gathers and annihilates Hu Zongnan's Central Army, or prevents them from sending reinforcements.

Once you get the mission, it takes a lot of effort to execute it. You want to contain the enemy, but they are human beings, they have brains like us, and they are not fools. So Commander Yang Dezhi ordered the troops to get as close as possible to Erma's army Build powerful field fortifications, and use small groups of troops to continuously harass and attack Erma's army, posing a posture that Ma is about to fight a decisive battle with Ma's army.

Commander Yang Dezhi believes that if you want to contain the enemy, you must let the enemy feel the pressure from our army, but how can you make the enemy feel the pressure from our army?Without causing too much loss to the troops, this is the art of command that a senior commander should possess.

In the evening of that day, Xu Guangda's Second Corps secretly detoured to Hu Zongnan's rear from the gap between Hu Zongnan's Central Army and the Second Horse Army.

Zhou Shidi's [-]th Corps moved from the west along the Longhai Railway and the Xianyang-Fengxiang Highway, piercing the enemy's depths, while Wang Zhen's [-]st Corps launched a fierce attack on the enemy from the south bank of the Weihe River and the north of the Qinling Mountains.

The plan of the field army was already clear when the campaign was implemented, that is, to use the second and No.18 regiments to detour from both sides, use the first regiment to attack from the front, and then dig out and eat Hu Zongnan's central army. Here is a key point However, the detours to the enemy's side are all large troops, and the movements of large troops are too large. How can we ensure the smooth implementation of the campaign plan without being noticed by the enemy?

The most critical thing is the Second Corps led by Commander Xu Guangda. The Second Corps will penetrate from the junction of Hu Zongnan and Ma's army, and then go around behind the buttocks of Hu Zongnan's troops to launch an attack, so as to achieve the suddenness after the start of the battle and shock the enemy. The confidence of the garrison, but this is also a risky move. If it is done well, it will be a wedge inserted in it, and if it is not done, it will be a bun.

If Hu Zongnan and Erma's troops have enough confidence to truly unite and come to an anti-encirclement after discovering the PLA's action intentions, the Second Corps may not be able to complete the task, and it will be in great danger itself, but Mr. Peng Finally, the enemy did not have the determination to fight together, and would not pay much attention to the defense of the joint, so he used such a dangerous move. In fact, this was a big move only after he had figured out the mentality of the enemy commander.

The joint defense operation plan negotiated by Hu Zongnan and Ma Bufang only stipulated their respective defense ranges, and there was no feasible joint operation plan. Five armies 3, 65, 119, 90, and 36 were placed side by side on the Baili defense line. Divisions and regiments overlap each other. Some officers think that such a formation is no different from sheep shitting, but Hu Zongnan believes that the troops can be arranged in such a way that they can form horns and criss-cross each other. , In this way, the heart-digging tactics used by the communist army will lose their effectiveness.

But Hu Zongnan never expected that Mr. Peng would attack him so soon. Hu Zongnan thought that although the Communist Army in North China had arrived in two regiments, these two regiments had just finished the Battle of Taiyuan and marched on foot for a longer distance. It will take a month to restore combat effectiveness, and the communist army that has recovered its combat effectiveness should be the first target of Erma's army, because his central army has formed five armies into one regiment, and it is difficult for the communist army to take one bite Eat it, so his central army is relatively safe at this stage.

Once again, things went beyond Hu Zongnan's expectation. There have been many times like this. Every time Hu Zongnan was confused by Boss Peng, he couldn't figure it out. When it comes to the wisdom of war, Hu Zongnan is far from Boss Peng. The opponent, the Central Army with more than 30 U.S. weapons, was defeated by the People's Liberation Army with more than 2 millets and rifles. It is no wonder that Boss Peng commented on Hu Zongnan's "great ambition, lack of talent, and an idiot".

When I was in Whampoa, Hu Zongnan was also a great person, much more famous than his classmates Xu Xiangqian, Zuo Quan, Chen Geng, Zhang Zongxun and another famous Red Army general Xu Jishen at the time. Xu Jishen, chief of staff of the Fourth Red Army, was killed by Zhang Guotao during the Great Curge.

In order to establish his personal absolute authority, Zhang Guotao massacred the Fourth Red Army. After the massacre, only two cadres of the 5000th regiment of the four divisions of the Fourth Red Army survived. The massacre was replaced three or four times. At that time, the Fourth Red Army had a total of more than 500 people, and more than 48 Red Army commanders and fighters were wiped out. Most of them were Red Army commanders with great combat experience. On the contrary, it later spread to the grassroots organizations. Except for two cooks, all Lu'an County Party Committee officials were killed, from the county Party committee secretary to the general cadres. This is only the cadres of the county party committee. It is impossible to count how many people were killed in the districts and townships below.

There are several criteria for Zhang Guotao's murder. First, the group of people who founded the Soviet base area and the Red Army; Yes, four, people who once opposed Zhang Guotao.

After such a pass, Zhang Guotao must be the boss in the Fourth Front Army that no one can oppose. Basically, those with a bit of prestige and ability were killed, but the combat effectiveness of the Red Army has also declined severely. The failure of the siege is also reasonable.

Looking back, on the evening of July 3, one day after Commander Yang Dezhi led the 65th Corps to contain the enemy's two-horse allied forces, the main force of the Second Corps passed through Hu Zongnan and the two-horse allied forces. The junction was detoured to the rear of the enemy's 119rd, [-]th, and [-]th armies, and the Second Corps also inserted to the west of Changning Town, near the Weihe River moving from Luoju Town. hit.