Crushing the Key-Point Offensive (Shaanbei and Menglianggu)

In March 1947, after the general offensive had been blunted, Kuomintang forces turned to key-point attacks on the Shaanbei and Shandong liberated areas. In northern Shaanxi, Hu Zongnan led over 200,000 men against Yan'an, while the Liberation Army there numbered only some 20,000. To preserve its strength, Mao Zedong decided to evacuate Yan'an voluntarily, saying: "If we keep the men and lose the land, both men and land will be kept; if we keep the land and lose the men, both men and land will be lost." Mao Zedong, Zhou Enlai and Ren Bishi led the Party Central Committee organs in remaining in northern Shaanxi to direct the national war of liberation, while Liu Shaoqi, Zhu De and others formed the Central Working Committee and went to North China. Peng Dehuai and Xi Zhongxun led the Northwest Field Army in "dawdling" tactics, wearing the enemy down, and won three battles in a row at Qinghuabian, Yangmaghe and Panlong, destroying over 14,000 enemy troops and stabilizing the situation in northern Shaanxi. In Shandong, the Kuomintang massed 450,000 troops against the liberated area. In May 1947 the East China Field Army under Chen Yi and Su Yu concentrated superior forces and wiped out the entire reorganized 74th Division, over 32,000 men, in the Menglianggu area of Mengyin County, Shandong, killing its commander Zhang Lingfu. The battle crushed the Kuomintang's key-point offensive in Shandong. The people of the Yimeng mountain area gave eager support to the front, and moving stories emerged such as that of the "Red Sisters of Yimeng," who nursed the wounded with their own milk. By June 1947, after a year of fighting, the Liberation Army had destroyed 1.12 million Kuomintang troops, the key-point offensive had been crushed, and the course of the war had turned in the Liberation Army's favor. The Liberation Army then moved to a strategic offensive.