MAP

Farewell, Manchuria

The orders from Nanjing were specific, and incredulous officers in General Du Yuming’s headquarters. General Du promptly began to carry out his orders, though his army began to experience difficulty quite quickly. Many of the soldiers in the 1st Army, the 71st and the 13th for the most part as well, carried out their instructions and marched out of Shenyang without incident. Trains left the city night and day with industrial equipment and raw materials evacuated from factories in the city until nearly all of the industry in Shenyang was relocated. Once the last of the trains rolled out of the city the NRA tasked infantrymen and engineers to tear up the rails and burn the ties. It was the others-- the former Japanese soldiers and the bandits out of Siping and Changchun initially, then others subsequently to that-- that took a different approach towards abandoning Shenyang. They began by requisitioning cars or carts at gunpoint, then rushing into whatever house they fell upon and loading the vehicle down with whatever they could that may have had value, and some which had no value.

Chaos soon enveloped the city, and some of the more conscientious NRA officers held up their retreat from the city to try and enforce some order on it. Those that stayed, though, more often than not would join in the plunder or mutiny if their officers tried to restrain them. The city was a lawless place, many buildings burned energetically as the forces of the People’s Liberation Army arrived and surveyed the scene. This proved ample fodder for the political apparatchiks turning out anti-KMT propaganda throughout Manchuria.

What transpired to the west, however, was more panic than malice. Word came that Fuxin had come under a mass assault by the PLA while General Du completed preparations to withdraw from Shenyang.

The Battle for Fuxin

This frontier was held by the 37th Army of the NRA, spared much of the fighting in and around Siping and Anshan and left to entrench, guarding the northern flank of the NRA’s territory in Manchuria.

The thing about Fuxin-- the city sat in something of a valley, with two “roads” leading to it through the hills and mountains, and a couple cart paths feeding those two roads. General Liu had something of an easier time plotting a defense in this situation. This early in January the NRA still maintained some degree of air superiority, leaving him wise to the massing tank divisions to his north. The new 76mm anti tank guns had only begun arriving, and he had a couple precious guns himself that he deployed to the passes.

Opening shots were fired on a snowy morning in the first days of 1948. T-34s began advancing through the passes north of Fuxin, escorted by motorized infantry. The PLA had begun to change, to evolve its tactics. NRA gunners knocked out the lead tanks, halting most of the columns, leading to a general engagement. More tanks came, more shells were lobbed up the valley at them. Soon, the aerial fight was joined. What few planes survived in the PLAAF, plus some newer replacements, tangled with the KMT’s air forces. The NRA fairly quickly gained the upper hand, and the air force began bombing the onrushing communists, encountering inaccurate AA fire.

Still, they came on. Every T-34 knocked out brought on a couple more steering around its burning hull. Infantry closed and engaged the guns, which were forced to withdraw. Soon, the NRA fell back to secondary positions, where they put up another fight, then tertiary positions. Dozens of tanks lay burning, perhaps hundreds, but the worst was yet to come: heavy tanks, IS-2s, rolling in with the reserves. These were untouchable outside of extreme close range for the majority of the NRA’s guns, and as such these new arrivals spearheaded much more successful advances, pushing within sight of Fuxin’s ancient walls.

In Fuxin the rest of the 76mm guns had been posted up in firing nests, pointed up the two streets leading through the town. They claimed several more tanks before, eventually, the defenders withdrew beyond the town and to the heights on the far side of the rail station. From this elevated position the gunners claimed only a couple more tanks, but Fuxin’s garrison fled and General Liu had little choice but to withdraw his guns and relocate to better ground in the south.

Here General Liu made a stand with the rest of the division, claiming still more tanks, but the onslaught could not be checked and they continued to withdraw up the valley, fighting a delaying action with declining success.

The Great Northern Retreat

The collapse of the defense in Fuxin seeded panic throughout the NRA in Manchuria. The most experienced units maintained their cohesion, retreating beyond the secondary line of defense at Fuxin and heading for Chengde. Units arriving from the south, namely the 77th, 86th, and 59th Armies, unloaded at Lioaning and Panjin, where they bore witness to long columns of retreating troops coming from Fuxin or Anshan respectively which did not do much to help morale. Some infantry slipped away to join in the retreat. Persistent communist air attack drove the retreating columns faster, as well as rumors of onrushing communist tanks. The truth of the matter was that nobody could truly rush anywhere as the winter had coated fields in snow and blocked roads, those few that existed.

In the west, in Chifeng, the 77th Army had orders to hold only if they deemed the position hold-able. With the news coming out of Fuxin, the command staff of the 77th Army promptly deemed the position un-hold-able. Lin Biao’s 3rd Field Army had already fallen upon them, though. Sounds of combat echoed down the passes into Chifeng, followed soon by retreating NRA soldiers and shortly thereafter the shriek of rocket artillery shattering building fronts and blasting market stalls to splinters. The 77th Army began an immediate withdrawal towards Chengde, with the rearguard fighting in numerous mountain passes. Unfortunately for all parties, the wet winter conditions rendered the roads into a morass, sucking in trucks and tanks alike. The retreat was slow, and the pursuit about as slow. 77th Army escaped the encirclement but without any of their heavy equipment, left behind in the panicked withdrawal.

13th Army had been pinned in place by the left flank of the PLA 7th Army, attempting to cover the retreat of the main body of NRA forces, but they were now in a perilous position: the rest of the NRA had successfully gotten to Panjin and were in the process of reorganizing a new defense to the south, but the 37th continued its southward retreat and left the 13th surrounded on three sides with the oncoming PLA 15th Army teeming through Shenyang. The 13th decided then that it was time to go, and they abandoned their positions east of the Liuhe River. PLA 7th Army’s pressure on their flank was constant, however, turning an orderly retreat into a rout. Forward elements of 13th Army reached Beizhen, where they tried to reorganize, but the panic resumed as a rumor started of more communist tanks coming down through the mountains from the direction of Fuxin and they kept running until they reached Panjin. The remnants were forced to reorganize by the rest of the NRA forces, though considerably weaker, bordering on combat-ineffective.

Then came the wires from Chengde. Lin Biao had reached the passes north of the city, and now the entire force in Manchuria was in imminent danger of encirclement. Divisions of the 8th Army were spread extraordinarily thin, but wintry conditions and the impassable nature of these mountains-- much of which only had dirt cart tracks or footpaths running along river valleys to traverse it-- had slowed the PLA offensive to a crawl, with their armor effectively neutralized by the terrain. Though much of the NRA was exhausted, General Du made the call to evacuate further to the tertiary defensive line at Chengde. It was not over yet.

Again, the strongest formations were withdrawn on the railroad to Chengde, the line from Panjin to Chengde via Liaoning still being held open by a strong defense at the Daling River-- the surviving units of PLA 7th Army advancing up the valley lacked the strength to drive across the river, and the 71st Army held the door open for now. 26th Army rode the rails south rather than north, disembarking at Qinhuangdao and preparing defenses there. Next to evacuate were the remnants of 37th and 13th Armies, and finally the 71st who were fighting back advances from the PLA 7th Army even as they boarded the trains to get out of dodge. 44th Army attempted an overland withdrawal, pulling out of Panjin. The survivors would arrive in Huhudao, riding on their tanks and in commandeered trucks.

Du Yuming had saved the 4th War Zone from total destruction, but what remained generally lacked heavy equipment and was in some formations severely demoralized. It was fortunate for them, then, that the PLA’s tanks had largely been destroyed or broken down and they’d reached the logistical breaking point, particularly with the destruction of their primary rail linkage with the Soviet Union, while driving the NRA back onto railheads from which they can quite quickly and easily resupply. Things in Manchuria largely stabilized as summer passed into autumn and both armies resupplied and licked their wounds.

Total casualties:

PLA: 220,000 dead/wounded/captured, 520 T-34 destroyed/rendered inoperable. 7 IS-2 destroyed/inoperable. 17 Yak-3 destroyed/inoperable, 15 Yak-9 destroyed/inoperable.

NRA: 190,000 dead/wounded/deserted, 180 Sherman destroyed/inoperable, 4 armies’ (77th, 37th, 13th, 44th) worth of heavy equipment lost/destroyed in the retreat. 37th Army combat ineffective due to losses/desertions.

Shanxi Blues

West of Yan’an, the PLA had fought with Ma Bufeng once already and been brought to a standstill. The warlord’s troops had proven their mettle, and Nanjing wanted them to continue to harass the PLA in the area-- this plan included relocating the 8th Cavalry Army south of the PLA’s territory in Yan’an. Ma saw an opportunity to flex his muscle, and ordered the 8th to drive clear across the PLA’s territory as a demonstration that their power was broken in the area-- and perhaps of his contempt for the communists.

8th Cavalry’s ride pierced the northern flank of the PLA 2nd Army, driving south along mountain roads and along riverbanks, largely facing little contact as a consequence of the PLA’s new directives-- larger commands were breaking down, vanishing into the passes and the countryside and moving south, away from the cavalrymen. The worst were skirmishes, squad- or company-sized formations of PLA soldiers fallen upon by horsemen galloping down the valleys. 8th Cavalry Army lost its share of men, but the losses were minimal.

The Race for Yan’an

Then came the information that organized communist resistance in Shanxi was being ordered to dissolve, striking out to the hills in smaller units. Yan Xishan, of late the warlord that ruled Shanxi, had been relentlessly asking for Chiang Kai-Shek to allow him to reclaim his old domain. Now, it seemed, the time had come. Yan’an, Mao’s capital for years, sat unguarded. What better prize could he bring to Chiang, and as a bonus he’d be reclaiming his own territory-- and he’d be damned if he let the Mas take it, as word was circulating about Ma Bufeng’s march across the PLA’s former territories west of the city.

On the far side of Yan’an Ma Bufeng, contemptible of the communists as always, bent his path of march towards Yan’an, utilizing the mountain tracks. Completely by accident, the rogue warlords had placed Yan’an between two pincers.

Describing to his men that their attack would support attacks to the north, Yan ordered elements of the 90th Army forward into the mountains… and encountered no more fixed communist defenses. Their advance was not easy, however, as they were harassed by PLA units at every turn. After a week of steady advance Yan Xishan reclaimed Yan’an, a day in advance of Ma Bufeng. Ma resumed his southward march from Yan’an, riding down PLA units along the road to Tongchuan.

The Ulanqab Offensive

Yan wasn’t done, though. The attack he was “supporting” in Yan’an and Yuliang took off towards Ulanqab at roughly the same time as the Race for Yan’an. Massed NRA forces unleashed a withering artillery barrage on PLA positions due south of the city, perhaps the largest yet in the war. The guns pounded the defensive positions around Fengzhen, and the attack was off.

Ulanqab came under attack from every direction. A reinforcing army from the direction of Hohhot pinned the western defenders in place, and the 92nd Army came from the east while the 8th Army fended off a PLA attack from the north, clinging desperately to mountain passes with enough success to buy time for reinforcements to come up from Chengde.

The southern attack, numbering nearly 200,000 NRA soldiers and all the tanks and artillery that come with them, smashed through the PLA and made a direct line for Ulanqab. 87th Army fought a rearguard action against a PLA counterattack towards the rear of the attack group, weakening the overall NRA attack but preventing a strike to the flank. The point they selected to attack drove a wedge between PLA 19th and PLA 18th Armies, isolating one corps of the PLA 19th with the PLA 18th and driving well into their rear.

Fengzhen fell to the NRA within a week of the opening of the offensive, and the PLA 14th Tank Division counterattacked the right flank of the offensive but air attack and anti-tank weapons punished the effort.

Disconcertingly, the PLA for the first time thus far contested control of the skies. Swarms of Yak-9 fighters swooped down from the north, engaging the P-51s attempting to secure the skies for the NRA. The fight was decisively tipped towards the NRA as their new 90mm AA guns began to arrive at the front. Heavy AA fire began to take its toll, as well as the swifter P-47s entering the fray in smaller numbers. With their higher service ceiling and slightly higher degree of experience at this early stage in the air war, the NRA was just able to establish local air superiority through the use of almost the entire air force, and so the ground forces pushed on.

In the west, the 61st Army struggled down from the mountains against elements of the PLA 21st Army. They managed to reach the plains, but not get much further than contesting the village of Haichengcun. 43rd Army made no appreciable progress striking out of Hohhot, as the PLA had anticipated such an attack and prepared accordingly.

96th Army continued its advance behind its armored spearhead, flanks covered by the 33rd and 87th Armies. They reached Ulanqab’s southern outskirts after a few weeks of campaigning, prompting the swift evacuation of the nascent PLAAF, though planes too damaged to flee were destroyed or left behind. The newly-built airfield north of the town came under artillery fire soon thereafter, scattering ground crews. Ulanqab became site of fierce fighting as the PLA 21st Army’s 70th Corps diverted a division from fending off 43rd Army to assist in holding the city. The city did fall, though it had been battered by tank shells and artillery. 70th Corps withdrew to the north, General Wei Ji well aware his command was threatened with encirclement.

Shuozhou 2

After consolidating and reorganizing, the NRA conducted a second phase of their operation-- a renewed assault on Shuozhou. Five armies lined up against the PLA 20th Army and elements of the PLA 21st Army and attacked south from points west, points north, and near Datong. The fall of the Ulanqab airfield granted relative air supremacy to the NRA, who utilized their remaining fighters and bombers to attack PLA positions in the open ground. Behind this curtain, a significant reorganization was taking place as the NRA shifted its most potent formations back towards Datong, cycling the less offensively-capable units into defensive roles around Ulanqab. 96th and 87th Armies arrived near Datong. The renewed drive for Shuozhou came from west and north, reaching behind the southward-facing defenses the PLA had dug. The most capable NRA formations utilized the same massed artillery tactics as had helped them to penetrate the lines north of Datong, only with the additional benefit that their spotter planes were able to operate with somewhat more impunity.

The open valley formed around the Sanggan River proved decent terrain for the operation of the NRA’s new Sherman tanks, organized into their larger army formations at the battalion level. While their crews lacked for experience they managed to do damage to the PLA, who in this sector lacked armor as it had been driven north during the Ulanqab offensive earlier in the year. Elements of two corps of the PLA, 66th and 67th, formed a series of defensive lines that slowed the NRA’s progress at significant cost, but were unable to prevent the forward progress of the armored battalions across the relatively open ground. Where the Sanggan River crossed the valley east-west is where the NRA encountered the most severe difficulty, and the PLA clawed to this position for weeks before massed artillery and air attack forced a costly crossing and the NRA rumbled onward.

In the west the Khampa army and Yan Xishan’s 34th Army coordinated to retake the ground yielded by the 61st Army after it moved to support the attack on Ulanqab, but achieved little else as they soon fell upon the same PLA defenses that had stopped the 61st Army in 1947, but strengthened by months of entrenchment. The most noteworthy achievement in this western push was to fully secure the village of Jingpingzhen, but the PLA halted this attack 20 kilometers north of Shuozhou and the Tibetans were not particularly interested in hurling themselves into strong PLA positions. Yan saw signs of greater success in the east and halted his 34th Army before it gored itself on the PLA’s defensive lines as well, instead ordering the 96th Army to continue the advance.

In early autumn, near the end of the campaign season, the 96th Army stripped a division each from 87th and 33rd Armies and launched a last-gap offensive to seize Shuozhou, dashing across the last 15 kilometers of ground before the snows came and locked them in place for the winter. This attack was, at last, successful and Shuozhou fell to the NRA after eighteen months of campaigning. PLA forces north of Shuozhou left their defenses and slipped out to the south-- though some more die-hard units broke ranks and vowed bloody vengeance upon the NRA, turning the mountains into a no-go zone for Chiang’s men.

This ended significant combat in Shanxi in 1948. So it was that Yan Xishan proudly reported to Chiang Kai-Shek that his forces had seized Yan’an, Luliang, and Ulanqab-- though the latter claim is dubious, as the 43rd Army had been bogged down in the mountains east of Hohhot and his 33rd and 34th Army covered the flanks of the actual attack on the city.

The PLA managed to avoid significant losses in the Shanxi offensives by utilizing the mountains to escape, though this was at the cost of their heavy equipment. Many of the units that were pushed around during the Ulanqab and Shuozhou attacks embarked upon their own long marches to return to PLA lines, and while this created some disorganization they maintained many bodies that otherwise may have surrendered or deserted.

Total Casualties:

PLA: 135,000 killed/wounded/captured, 70 T-34 destroyed/inoperable, 142 Yak-3 and 81 Yak-9 shot down/destroyed on ground/captured. Ulanqab Airfield lost.

NRA: 88,000 killed/wounded/deserted, 76 Sherman destroyed/inoperable, 73 P-51s shot down/inoperable, 22 P-47s shot down/inoperable.

Shandong

There was much sound and fury south of Qingdao as the surrounded PLA forces collapsed. Morale in the pocket fell further for every mile the NRA put between them and liberation. An effort to supply the pocket by sea failed as NRA coastal defenses quickly noted the procession of boats heading towards Hungdao and began firing shells at them. Fishing boat captains soon learned it was a dangerous jaunt, and refused PLA “charters.” Further expeditions by commandeered boats were often turned back by the Navy, which had deployed destroyers to guard the coast and occasionally fire some shells into the hills in the middle of the night to keep the PLA from being able to rest.

The pocket wouldn’t have long to wait before the war returned to them, though. The NRA’s Fifth Army Group focused its full effort on collapsing the pocket, launching an artillery barrage second only to that recently fired in Shanxi, battering PLA positions and rattling the less well-trained peasant troops. Attacks followed, bringing the two forces into close contact at which point offers were extended for the PLA troops: turn over your officers and commissars, surrender, and get lands in Yunnan or elsewhere in the south of China. Not many took these offers up, but some did and delivered a handful of commissars to the NRA who were promptly shot.

Another barrage followed, further reducing the perimeter, and morale continued to plummet as help was evidently not coming. More men began to desert, but cognizant of this Chen Zaidao, commanding officer of the 10th Corps, broke ranks and issued orders for his men to vanish into the population. This was only successful in part-- tens of thousands of NRA soldiers flooded the collapsed pocket, followed closely by the Juntong. Many of the thousands of PLA soldiers were collared and deported to the south of China, and many officers and commissars were captured and executed summarily.

The Running Battles of the Zibo Corridor

South of Zibo was a long-time PLA base area, and a prime target for the NRA now that they felt sure they had broken the back of the PLA in Shandong. Six armies staged along the Jinan-Jining railway and near Linyi, and set off into the area. Masses of infantry marauded through the area, clearing valleys. Homes were ransacked, searched, and more often than not robbed of anything of value. If communist paraphernalia or weapons were found the homes and farms were generally burned, the communists detained to await the coming of the Juntong after which point they generally were never seen again.

Yet, even as this torch and burn operation took off the PLA’s 2nd Army marched into the same area with the intention of dispersing into KMT-held territory and reengaging in the people’s war. These two forces clashed in a series of infantry-only battles throughout the Zibo salient, hampering the PLA 2nd Army’s efforts to slip into the central plains. It was a summer of gunshots in the area, but the better-trained forces of the 5th Army Group-- trained and equipped among the best formations in the NRA-- managed to consistently scatter the smaller groups of PLA troops piecemeal.

Hundreds of farms were searched and, in some cases, burned. Thousands of suspected communists were taken away. Grain stores were seized and relocated to urban centers from which point they would be utilized to feed the rural populations over the coming winter, placing the peasants in a position where they depended on the KMT to survive the cold months.

5th Army Group arrived in Zibo, engaging in a stand-up battle with the PLA 4th Army’s 13th Corps, which was compelled to yield the ground after the arrival of elements of the 71st Army and its heavy guns from Jinan. With Zibo taken, the force continued north towards Binzhou and from there to Dongying.

In Binzhou and Dongying, the Juntong arrested much of the communist civil administration and, for the most part, killed them or shipped them south. KMT sympathizers were invited to join the NRA on its journey south, getting them out of dodge and saving them from communist reprisals. Left behind were two cities in anarchy as the local administration had been effectively beheaded and the leadership of the communist police forces had been itself arrested.

Upon reaching the Yellow Sea, they turned around and went back through, seizing the autumn harvest as well and searching, imprisoning, and executing those communists they could find in villages they hadn’t searched the first time through. By the time the 5th Army Group returned to its base areas north of Linyi the salient had been destroyed quite thoroughly, surprisingly, with the misery of the peasantry galvanizing some to the communist cause but beating more into a sort of helpless submission as they lined up for food in Jinan or Jining. A series of outposts had been constructed to maintain control over the region, but little serious effort had been put into holding this ground.

Total casualties:

PLA: 30,000 killed/wounded/captured in Huangdao pocket, 15,000 in Zibo Corridor battles.

NRA: 9,000 killed/wounded/deserted in Zibo Corridor battles.

Hebei

The Zibo expedition proved a model for a smaller copy coming down from Peking. Armies coming south and east seized the grain stores, forcing the locals into compliance through food. Communists were arrested, their homes ransacked, and they were generally killed by the Juntong. Like near Zibo, minimal effort was put into holding the land conventionally.

Further to the west, a campaign was undertaken to finally clear the Shijiazhuang pocket. 23rd Army took to the mountains, hunting down rebels and their bases. The partisans retreated up the mountain range. This meant the pocket was not collapsed so much as forced to relocate to the north, relieving some pressure (but not all) from the railway running from Linfen to points north via Taiyuan.

Neither operation produced notable casualties for either side, save for a few killed here or there in skirmishes.

CCP Home Front

The economic situation in Shandong has continued to be pretty bleak, with many in PLA-controlled areas reduced to bartering to receive any goods-- and there are many fewer goods with the NRA blowing through and seizing them all. The people in Shandong and some of Hebei are hungry and miserable as winter sets in, and many are meekly filing into NRA safe-zones to get enough food to keep their family alive during the snowy months. In effect, CCP influence is being overall reduced in these areas, though those that remain loyal to the CCP are ride-or-die for it now.

Binzhou and Dongying have had their communist authorities arrested and deported, leaving the cities in a state of chaos that has been filled by average citizens reestablishing working civil authorities that are, more or less, apolitical and more interested in keeping the trains running in their cities so to speak.

Inside of Manchuria, the communist heartland, things are somewhat less bleak. Honghuzi bandits now run amok in parts of the country, perhaps taking advantage of the war near Shenyang drawing tremendous resources to the south. Numerous villages had been raided until a daring air raid that destroyed the Nenjiang railway bridge in Qiqihai drew the attention of the highest echelons of the CCP to the slow-moving crisis. Consequently, resupply to the forces in the south of Soviet equipment and parts would be drastically slowed until a new bridge could be built.

Chinese peasants, never ideologues, have grown increasingly disillusioned with the marauding raiders going unpunished by the communist authorities. They increasingly call for the PLA to send their sons home to protect them in Manchuria and a current of anti-war sentiment is beginning to run through the millions of hungry families whose fathers and sons have been drafted to go and fight the Kuomintang-- nearly 10% of the population of Manchuria, or a third of fighting-age men have thus far been drafted. To some portion of the peasantry, Mao and his CCP ilk are beginning to look like just another set of callous warlords present to exploit them for gold and bodies to throw into wars far from home.

Back on the topic of the Honghuzi raider problem, one band of particular note has crossed the Amur and raided the village of Srednyaya Borzya, setting fire to several buildings and firing some shots at pursuing Soviet border guards before retreating back into north-eastern Manchuria. Among the growing bandit culture in Manchuria, they are celebrities for their “daring” raid.

KMT Home Front

Hoo, boy. Here we go.

Nantong

The communist bandits, thus far ignored, grew quite empowered and attempted to completely surround Nantong on the north bank of the Yangtze River. The local garrison commander began to receive reports of attacks on the roads to Taizhou and acted-- the garrison began rounding up anyone suspected of having communist ties and imprisoning them, and a call was put in to 7th Army in Shanghai. A division was shuttled across the river, and a counterattack planned.

Moving village-to-village the reinforcements searched out the communist bandits and pushed back on the efforts to surround the city, experiencing a small degree of success that prevented the total surrounding of Nantong.

Pocket reduced to around 30,000 men, accounting for arrests and deaths.

Wuhu

The cell had been battered by authorities and somewhat disorganized. Plans to relocate duly leaked to the Jutong, and while they did make it to the safety of the mountains the Nanjing garrison was not keen on their presence. Routine patrols were soon established to disrupt the organization of the cell, with some success.

Pocket reduced to 8,000 or so men, accounting for arrests, deaths, and desertions (both this year and last, I don’t think I did casualties there).

Ningbo

Guerrilla efforts to surround the city to the south mostly go without a hitch, though the northern half of the pocket remained isolated. Efforts to get support from 7th Army in Shanghai by the Ningbo garrison were heeded, though guerrillas derailed the train as it passed through the valley heading to Ningbo. NRA survivors managed to fight off the raiders by bunkering down in the destroyed train, and subsequent retaliatory raids into the northern hills and mountains saw the scattering of that cell. The city was effectively cut off by all but the northern approaches, however.

1,200 NRA losses from 7th Army, 300 from Ningbo garrison.

2,000 losses from PLA Ningbo cell.

Huangshan

Thousands of communist guerrillas have successfully surrounded Huangshan, leaving the KMT garrison in dire straits as only occasional shipments of food and ammunition have been able to reach the city without being harassed or stolen by the communist guerillas. Aerial resupply has proven marginally successful, but morale is plummeting and large-scale desertions have begun absent draconian disciplinary measures. Desperate pleas for help have been received over the radio by the NRA… and the PLA.

~1,000 or so NRA soldiers have walked off the job in Huangshan and the city is ready to surrender if not relieved by the first couple months of 1949.

500 guerrillas killed in skirmishes to keep supply corridors closed throughout the year.

Wuhan and Surroundings

The dire news from Huangshan has put the fear of guerrillas into the command staff of 48th Army in Wuhan. The military has been mobilized to combat growing guerrilla cells east of the city, and as they attempt to expand they find that the military has adopted the same tactics they had in Ningbo and Huangshan-- NRA units halted in the passes leading up into the mountains and stopped all supply from traveling into them. While this does increase the misery of mountain communities, it has had the same effect on communist insurgents-- with increasingly scarce food and the onset of winter, their situation is an unhappy one. Some deserters have been caught and publicly executed as an example, which has both prevented further desertions but damaged morale significantly.

South of Xianning, the communist cell has had an easier time of expanding as their northern comrades have drawn the ire of the Wuhan garrison almost entirely.

2,000 desertions from eastern cell, 1,000 dead from the NRA campaign to seal the supply passes.

1,000 NRA dead from 48th Army.

Fuzhou

At the ultimate hour, as the chaos grew to a fever pitch, amphibious ships landed at Jiangtian, disembarking a division of fresh troops from Taiwan sent to figure out what in the hell was going on in Fuzhou. Fighting ensued, but per their instructions the guerrillas gave up their encirclement and retreated to the mountains when the NRA’s force came to bear.

The city was thus placed under a de facto state of siege as the communists retreated to the mountains and began raiding land routes into Fuzhou.

5,000 dead/wounded/captured from the Fuzhou cell.

1,500 dead/wounded from the 20th Army.

Guangzhou

95th Army, newly garrisoned in Guangzhou, became aware of many thousands of guerrillas raiding overland roads and rail lines and developed a campaign against the aforementioned guerrillas. Marching into the hills, the 95th Army sought to fight them head-on. They simply… couldn’t nail them down. The fighting was sporadic and demoralizing, and smaller unit commanders refused to continue with the campaign, returning to Guangzhou in a sort of soft mutiny.

Even so, the ill-fated campaign slowed the efforts of the guerrillas to surround Guangzhou. Some of the commanders saw decent success in repelling the guerrillas, leaving the situation overall confused.

5,000 dead/captured/deserted from NRA 95th Army.

3,200 dead/captured from Guangzhou cell.

Meizhou

Utilizing mountain paths and patient planning, the Meizhou cell has effectively surrounded Meizhou though escorted convoys can still make it to the city to bring in supplies. There is mounting discontent in the city, though, and the situation is critical there.

1,000 dead/deserted from NRA garrison.

500 dead/captured from Meizhou cell.

Hainan

Chaos reigns! An additional division from Taiwan has arrived to push back against the teeming hordes of communist guerrillas. Fortunately for the KMT, the teeming hordes have to share extremely scarce supplies and ammunition, crippling their combat effectiveness. In contrast, the KMT could slip supplies into Haikou and prepare for a counteroffensive. New 7th Division began to secure the northern half of the island, working with the local garrison to capture as many of the thousands of ill-equipped guerrillas as possible.

800 casualties from New 7th Division.

8,000 killed, captured, surrendered, or deserted from Hainan cell.

The West

The Ili National Army activated in favor of the CCP, expanding the frontiers of East Turkestan into the Gobi Desert and some of the mountains south of Ili. The fighting was essentially nonexistent, As the Ili National Army was effectively the only force that wanted the Gobi Desert. The advance slowed near Urumqi, where the two forces ineffectually lobbed shells at each other for most of the rest of the year. This backwater front saw little other action.

They Have Angered the Economy

A different sort of impending crisis landed on Chiang Kai-Shek’s desk late in 1948-- inflation was running rampant in much of China, and the country was blowing through what money it had left. Wang Yun-Wu, Minister of Finance, raised the alarm. Within a couple years China would simply run out of money. The consequences would be predictably disastrous for the Kuomintang. While they could afford to make payments for fiscal year 1948, from this point forward the financial situation grew much more bleak. Something had to be done.

Just End it Already

Throughout the east of China, a curious movement of students has taken to the streets. With the millions dead during the civil war and the war of resistance against Japan, most knew someone or were related to someone who had died. These students marched for an end to the war in most cities. Manchurian students, those few that had not yet been drafted into the PLA or NRA, protested for their friends to come home from the front. Students in Dalian protested continued Soviet occupation, and students throughout the cities south of the Great Wall simply wanted the bloodshed to stop.

Perhaps most surprising was the apolitical nature of the protests-- they had no major linkages to the communists or the Kuomintang. War weariness had begun to grip all of China.