Battle of Shangcai

Battle of Shangcai
Part of the Chinese Civil War
Date June 17, 1948 - June 19, 1948 Location Henan, China Result Communist victory
Belligerents
National Revolutionary Army	People's Liberation Army
Commanders and leaders
Hu Lian	Song Shi-Lun
Strength
20,000	12,000
Casualties and losses
5,000	several thousand

Battle of Shangcai was a series of clashes fought between the nationalists and the communists during Chinese Civil War in the post World War II era, and resulted in the communist victory. The battle is also called the Blocking Actions at Shangcai (上蔡阻击战) by the communists, who launched the battle to support their Eastern Hennan Campaign, with intention to prevent the nationalist force from reinforce their comrades-in-arms fighting the Eastern Hennan Campaign.

Contents 1 Prelude 2 Order of battle 3 Strategies 4 Battle 5 See also 6 References

Prelude

During the first half of the Chinese Civil War, communists lacked the necessary weaponry to destroy large formations of nationalist troops who were stationed in fortifications, so they must be lured out of the fortifications and engaged in the open field where communists would have a chance, and one of such occasion rose in June, 1948. On June 15, 1948, communists had decided to launch Eastern Hennan Campaign to attack Kaifeng, thus forcing the nationalists to reinforce the defense of the city via redeployment. Communists planned to take the opportunity to destroy the nationalist reinforcement force while it was on the move.

Order of battle

Nationalists Order of battle:

• Army-sized 11th Reorganized Division commanded by Hu Lian
  • 3 division-sized brigades

communists Order of battle:

• 10th Column commanded by Song Shilun 宋时轮
  • 28th Division
  • 29th Division commanded by Xiao Feng 肖锋 political commissar Li Mancun 李曼村
    • Brigade-sized 85th Regiment
    • Brigade-sized 86th Regiment
    • Brigade-sized 87th Regiment

Strategies

Communist strategy

• The nationalist 11th Reorganized Division was already on its northern march toward Kaifeng, to prevent it from reinforcing nationalist force defending the city, the communist commander Song Shilun (宋时轮) decided to attack Shangcai (上蔡), where the nationalist 11th Reorganized Division setup its headquarter, thus forcing the nationalist division to return to save its own headquarter.

Nationalist strategy

• Hu Lian (胡琏), the nationalist commander of the 11th Reorganized Division was well aware the communist strategy and adjust his plan accordingly. Giving up the mission to reinforce Kaifeng, Hu Lian (胡琏) ordered all of his force to turn back, and planned to use his headquarter as a bait to attract the enemy, while his main force would attack the enemy from the other side, destroying the enemy in a two fronts assault. Though this move would mean that he had to give up the rescue of the city exactly as his enemy had hoped, it was a good price to pay in exchange of totally destroying the enemy’s 10th Column.

Battle

In the morning of June 16, 1948, Song Shilun (宋时轮)’s 10th Column at Leave County (Yexian, 叶县) and Dancing Sun (Wuyang, 舞阳) in western Henan received order to reach north of Shangcai (上蔡) and be ready for the incoming battle no later than 9:00 AM next morning. When the 28th and the 29th Divisions of the communist 10th Column were ready to move out, it was already 2:00 pm on June 16, 1948. To travel to their destination in 17 hours at 90 km away, many communist troops were forced to sleep while on the move. To ensure the timely arrival and preparation, the communist commander himself and his chief-of-staff Gong Zuoyao (工作尧) traveled with the 29th Division, and the communist troops reached their destination on time.

The communists begun their attack on the town of Shangcai (上蔡) after taking a short break, with the three regiments of the 29th Division shouldered the main responsibility of attacking the nationalist headquarter: the 85th Regiment attacked the regions of Single Hamlet (Dan Zhuang, 单庄) and Little Village (Xiao Ji, 小集) to the north of the town after taking regions including Wheat Store (Mairen Dian, 麦仁店), and Plum Hamlet (Li Zhuang, 李庄), the 86th Regiment attacked and took the regions Western Flood Bridge (Xi Hong Qiao, 西洪桥), Liu Bridge (Liu Qiao, 刘桥), Kudzu Hamlet (Ge Zhuang, 葛庄), Sloped Zhao Village (Bo Zhao Cun, 坡赵村), of the 87th Regiment attacked and took the regions of Dong Hamlet (Dong Zhuang, 董庄), and Juan Liu (圈刘). By the night of June 17, 1948, all of the dispatched units of the nationalist 11th Reorganized Division had turned back to rescue the headquarter at Shangcai (上蔡), and much heavier fighting was expected by both sides.

The only way to return to Shangcai (上蔡) was via the narrow strip of land beginning at the Eastern Flood Bridge (Dong Hong Qiao, 东洪桥) in the east and ended at the Wheat Store (Mairen Dian, 麦仁店) in the west. The local rugged terrain, however, was ill-suited for the highly mechanized nationalist force, and this was exploited by the communists to the maximum. At 8:00 am on June 18, 1948, the nationalist 11th Reorganized Division launched its all out attack on the communists but the progress was painfully slow due to the unfavorable terrain. After eight hour of continuous fighting, the nationalist offensive stopped and both sides rested and prepared for the next round of fighting. By 10:00 PM, the communists withdrew to the second line of the defense by redeploying their 28th Division to the regions of Fan Hamlet (Fan Zhuang, 樊庄), Luo Pavilion (Luo Ge, 罗阁), Jiang Hamlet (Jiang Zhuang, 蒋庄), Xiao Slope (Xiao Po, 肖坡), and their 29th Division to the regions of King’s Pavilion (Wang Ge, 王阁), Xiadi Pass (Xia Di Guan, 下地关), Hundred Feet Village (Bai Chi Ji, 百尺集), and Thunder Hamlet (Lei Zhuang, 雷庄).

Fierce fighting resumed and continued to the next day. After suffering five thousand casualties and realizing the rugged terrain had severely limited the effectiveness of the superior firepower, the nationalist commander refused to be drawn into a war of attrition anymore in a terrain favoring the enemy and decided to call it a quit. Since turning back to reinforce Kaifeng was too late to do, the nationalists withdrew southward, abandoning the hope of annihilating the communist 10th Column. The communists, in the meantime, successfully achieving their original objective of preventing the nationalists from reinforce Kaifeng did not pursuit and ended the battle.

See also

• List of battles of the Chinese Civil War
• National Revolutionary Army
• History of the People's Liberation Army
• Chinese Civil War

Main events pre-1945	Main events post-1945	Specific articles
First United Front (1924) Shanghai massacre of 1927 Nanchang Uprising Autumn Harvest Uprising Guangzhou Uprising Sino-Soviet conflict (1929) Encirclement Campaigns (1930–1934) Chinese Soviet Republic (1931–1934) Long March (1934–1936) Xi'an Incident (1936) Second United Front (1937–1946)	Part of the Cold War Full-scale Civil War (1946–1949) Kuomintang Islamic Insurgency in China (1950–1958) Campaign at the China–Burma Border (1960–1961) First Taiwan Strait Crisis (1955) Second Taiwan Strait Crisis (1958) Third Taiwan Strait Crisis (1996) Pan-Blue visits to mainland China (2005–)	Political status of Taiwan Legal status of Taiwan Chinese reunification Taiwan independence Cross-Strait relations Primary participants Kuomintang of China Communist Party of China

References

• Zhu, Zongzhen and Wang, Chaoguang, Liberation War History, 1st Edition, Social Scientific Literary Publishing House in Beijing, 2000, ISBN 7801492072 (set)
• Zhang, Ping, History of the Liberation War, 1st Edition, Chinese Youth Publishing House in Beijing, 1987, ISBN 750060081X (pbk.)
• Jie, Lifu, Records of the Libration War: The Decisive Battle of Two Kinds of Fates, 1st Edition, Hebei People's Publishing House in Shijiazhuang, 1990, ISBN 7202007339 (set)
• Literary and Historical Research Committee of the Anhui Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, Liberation War, 1st Edition, Anhui People's Publishing House in Hefei, 1987, ISBN 7212000078
• Li, Zuomin, Heroic Division and Iron Horse: Records of the Liberation War, 1st Edition, Chinese Communist Party History Publishing House in Beijing, 2004, ISBN 7801990293
• Wang, Xingsheng, and Zhang, Jingshan, Chinese Liberation War, 1st Edition, People's Liberation Army Literature and Art Publishing House in Beijing, 2001, ISBN 750331351X (set)
• Huang, Youlan, History of the Chinese People's Liberation War, 1st Edition, Archives Publishing House in Beijing, 1992, ISBN 7800193381
• Liu Wusheng, From Yan'an to Beijing: A Collection of Military Records and Research Publications of Important Campaigns in the Liberation War, 1st Edition, Central Literary Publishing House in Beijing, 1993, ISBN 7507300749
• Tang, Yilu and Bi, Jianzhong, History of Chinese People's Liberation Army in Chinese Liberation War, 1st Edition, Military Scientific Publishing House in Beijing, 1993 – 1997, ISBN 7800217191 (Volum 1), 7800219615 (Volum 2), 7800219631 (Volum 3), 7801370937 (Volum 4), and 7801370953 (Volum 5)