Битва за мост Лудин: героический прорыв Красной армии

The Battle of Luding Bridge of 1935 was a controversial crossing of the Luding Bridge by the soldiers of the Fourth Regiment of the Chinese Workers and Peasants' Army during the Long March. The bridge, situated over the Dadu River in Luding County, Garzê Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan, China, was located about 80 kilometers west of the city of Ya'an and was a river crossing vital to the Red Army.

Fleeing from pursuing Chinese Nationalist forces, the communists found that there were not enough boats to cross the Dadu River (Sichuan province). Thus, they were forced to use Luding Bridge, a Qing dynasty suspension bridge built in 1701. The bridge consisted of thirteen heavy iron chains with a span of some 100 yards. Thick wooden boards lashed over the chains provided the roadway across the bridge. On the morning of May 28, 1935, the 4th regiment of Lin Biao's 2nd division, 1st Corps of the Chinese Red Army, received an urgent order from general headquarters: Luding Bridge must be captured on May 29, 1935, one day ahead of the original schedule. The 4th regiment then marched 120 km in less than 24 hours. Along the way, they engaged and defeated numerous nationalist forces which blocked their path. On the dawn of May 29, 1935, Lin Biao's troops reached the bridge, only to discover that local warlords allied with the ruling Kuomintang had removed most of the planks on the bridge. Furthermore, Luding City itself was occupied by a regiment of troops from warlord Liu Wenhui's 38th Brigade, 4th brigade, under the 5th division of the 24th Corps. The brigade's commander, Li Quanshan (李全山), was also a wealthy opium dealer. This was a common business for many of the local warlord commanders. Li divided his regiment into two parts, with two battalions deployed inside Luding City, while another battalion was deployed some distance outside in the suburb. His defending forces still enjoyed numerical superiority over the attacking Red Army. The 4th regiment had lost considerable strength during the hurried 24 hour march approximately two thirds of the soldiers had fallen behind during the march and only a battalion sized force had reached the western bank of the Luding Bridge that morning.

A major factor that contributed to the Chinese Red Army's victory was that the local warlords were mainly concerned with Chiang Kai shek and his plans to take over their territories, and they felt much less threatened by the Red Army's passing through. The area containing Luding bridge was controlled by the warlord Liu Wenhui (刘文辉), who fought the civil wars in Sichuan Province against his own nephew, the warlord Liu Xiang (刘湘). Liu Xiang managed to have nearly all of the other warlords in Sichuan join him in the struggle against his uncle. Chiang ostensibly remained neutral at the beginning of Sichuan's provincial conflicts in order to weaken the local warlords by letting them fight each other. Once the provincial warlords were weak and in disarray, Chiang's forces moved in and took over. Gradually, it was apparent that the nephew would prevail over the uncle because the nephew was willing to take heavy troop losses in exchange for territory. The uncle was unwilling to sacrifice large number of his troops during initial skirmishes with his nephew. Knowing Liu Xiang would probably not survive a massive counterattack from Liu Wenhui, Chiang shifted his support to the nephew Liu Xiang. But the anticipated counterattack from Liu Wenhui never came. Liu Xiang eventually defeated his own uncle, Liu Wenhui, forcing the latter to retreat to Xikang Province. Chiang was then able to face a weak alliance of smaller warlords rather than confront a single strong warlord that dominated the entire province. As Chiang had expected, when Liu Wenhui's defeat became obvious, the smaller alliance of warlords soon existed in name only. As a result of the provincial conflicts Liu Wenhui, like the other warlords, was extremely reluctant to commit his force in any significant numbers to fight the Red Army. Knowing that the communists were only passing by, Liu Wenhui, like other warlords, preserved his forces to fight other warlords in Sichuan. Strength preservation was vital to his survival: his force had been reduced to 20,000 from its previous peak of 120,000.

In addition to preserving forces to fight others, the local warlords were also keen to preserve their forces to keep Chiang out of their own territory. Prior to the Red Army entering Sichuan Province, Chiang's army had followed the Red Army into the neighboring Guizhou province, ostensibly to help the local warlord, Wang Jialie (王家烈), fight them. When the Red Army left Guizhou, Chiang's troops remained. Blamed for failing to stop the Red Army, Wang Jialie was removed by Chiang with the backup of his newly deployed troops in the province. The local warlords knew that they could return and regain control of their territory after the Red Army had left; however, if Chiang's army came, they would be removed for good. Therefore, despite Chiang's advisors' accurate prediction of the need of at least three regiments—and possibly four or five—of the local warlord's troops to stop a single Red Army regiment, the local warlord only deployed a single regiment at Luding Bridge. The main force was deployed to block Chiang's two regiments sent to reinforce the defense of Luding Bridge. The defenders of Luding Bridge were well aware of the political situation after witnessing the fall of the neighboring warlord in Guizhou province and were not willing to sacrifice their own lives for Chiang's potential take over. Following a divide and conquer tactic, Chiang awarded the local military command of the northern Dadu River region to a smaller Sichuanese warlord, Yang Sen (杨森). Yang Sen had allied with the second largest Sichuanese warlord, Liu Xiang. Together they began fighting against the biggest Sichuanese warlord Liu Wenhui. At the time of the Luding Bridge incident, the region was still under Liu Wenhui's control. Liu Wenhui's troops certainly would not take orders from the lesser rival Yang Sen. Although he received military, political, as well as financial support from Chiang Kai shek, Yang Sen would not sacrifice his own troops by sending them to help Liu Wenhui stop the communists. Both were well aware of Chiang's divide and conquer strategy, and both held their main forces to prepare for Chiang's potential take over. Knowing the local opium dependent warlord commanders were incapable of stopping the communist forces, Chiang tried to send more capable officers from his own officer corps to advise the local troops. These attempts were politely but unanimously rejected by all local Sichuanese warlords, as they feared Chiang's takeover.

Numerous surviving Chinese Red Army veterans recalled that the weapons used by the local warlords guarding the bridge were far inferior to the weapons used by the Chinese Red Army, suggesting that the incident may have been exaggerated. While the Chinese Red Army soldiers had high morale and were brave, their superior weaponry was probably equally important:

Realizing their dangerous situation, the Chinese Red Army sent their elite troops to seize the bridge. The soldiers were armed with the best of the weapons captured from the National Revolutionary Army, which in turn had German assistance; the assault team members were all armed with submachine guns with an effective range of 300–400 meters while many others were armed with the semi automatic rifles with an effective range of up to 800 meters. In contrast, the local warlord's troops were armed only with bolt action rifles, many of which were single shot rifles so that their firepower was far less dense than the firepower the Chinese Red Army was able to deploy. Another important factor was the ammunition. The Chinese Red Army used the best ammunition they had captured from the nationalists. These included a significant amount of foreign made ammunition. The bullets used by the provincial warlord's troops were locally manufactured. They were far inferior in quality even when compared to ammunition from other domestic Chinese arms manufacturers, such as Shanghai. In addition, most of the provincial troops' bullets were decades old. When the Red Army troops test fired captured cartridges after their victory, it was discovered that the ammunition used by the local warlord's troops only had a maximum range of around 100 meters. When fired from a rifle at standing position, most of the bullets would drop to the ground at approximately 100 meters. This was not enough to cover even the length of the bridge. The machine guns deployed by the local warlord's troops used the same ammunition, with the same range problems. This discovery was affirmed decades later when surviving members of the local warlords' troops were interviewed abroad The survivors said that they had neither the density of fire nor the rate of fire needed to suppress the Chinese Red Army. In fact, they were forced to take cover for most of the time during the battle, and rarely fired any shots. The interviewers concluded that the superior density of fire, rate of fire, and accuracy gave the Chinese Red Army the edge.

On their way to Luding Bridge, the soldiers of the 4th regiment, 2nd division, 1st corps of the Chinese Red Army discovered that on the opposite bank, two regiments of the nationalist reinforcement were on their way to Luding Bridge. The nationalists were faster because they used torches at night, while the communists avoided them in order to move without being detected. When Red Army commander Wang Kaixiang and political commissar Yang Chengwu (杨成武) did finally decide to use torches, they were discovered by their adversaries. Neither of the forces had any radio equipment, and the sound of the raging river made vocal communication impossible. Consequently, the nationalists used bugles for command and control. However, the communists successfully fooled the nationalists into believing that they were on the same side by using the bugle commands of Chiang Kai shek's ally and designated regional commander, Yang Sen, in reply to the nationalists' signals. In the face of heavy rains, the nationalists stopped their march and camped. The communists pressed on, and the battalion sized contingent arrived at the bridge first. On the eastern bank, the right column already started their march to the Luding Bridge. The Nationalist 10th infantry regiment, 4th brigade was the closest opposing force to the communists, and began spreading out along the Dadu river. On May 27, 1935, the 2nd regiment of the 1st division of the communist force defeated the nationalist 10th regiment at Waba (瓦坝) after several hours of fierce fighting. The next day, after more than a 50 km march, the communist 2nd regiment successfully defeated the remaining units of the nationalist 10th regiment. On May 29, 1935, the communist 2nd regiment engaged the nationalist 11th regiment, and with the help of the communist 3rd regiment, which arrived after the battle began, completely wiped out the nationalist 12th regiment. The communist 2nd and 3rd regiments then proceeded to destroy the brigade headquarters located 25 km away from Luding Bridge. The nationalist commander of the 4th brigade, Yuan Guorui (袁国瑞), fled with his surviving staff to the surrounding mountains, from where they were unable to reestablish links with the rest of the nationalist forces after the bridge and the city were both taken by the communists. This left to Li Quanshan (李全山), the regimental commander of the 38th regiment, the task of organizing the defense, which he was unable to accomplish.

There were actually two battles fought simultaneously at the site, one at the bridge and the other in Luding City, although due to the needs of political propaganda, the second battle was not publicized until recently. Indeed, it was the second battle that was fought at the suburb of Luding City that was critical in taking the bridge, and the first shot of all was fired in this "second" battle. Furthermore, it was not the twenty two members of the assault team from the 2nd company, 4th regiment that first entered Luding City, but the 7th company of the same regiment, with more than five dozen soldiers, who first succeeded in breaking into the city. After reaching the bridge, the commander and the political commissar of the 4th regiment, 2nd division, Chinese Red Army 1st Corps divided the troops into three formations: one assault team to attack the bridge, one team to cross the river and attack them from behind from the suburb of Luding City, and the majority of the force to provide the cover for the assault team. The 7th company was assigned to perform the second task. There was a turn of the Dadu River two km downstream from Luding Bridge, which made it impossible for the defenders of the city to see what was going on at the turn—besides, the nationalist defenders never expected that anyone would cross from there. As a result, the 7th company was able to cross the Dadu River with two rafts, and there was not a single enemy soldier at the opposite shore. After the crossing, the sixty soldiers of the 7th company marched upstream toward Luding City on the eastern bank of Dadu River. Around 2:00 p. m. on May 29, 1935, the 7th company was discovered by the sentries of the battalion the nationalist defenders deployed outside the city, and the nationalist sentries hastily fired the first shots of the battle at the Luding Bridge. However, the communist soldiers and the nationalist soldiers were more than 250 meters apart; the bullets of the nationalist soldiers could not reach their targets due to the nationalists' inferior weaponry. The communist soldiers of the 7th company immediately assaulted the enemy position and conquered the nationalist battalion within two hours. Learning that the Red Army had come from behind, the nationalist commanders immediately sent out another battalion for reinforcement, leaving only a token force to guard the bridge. The nationalists were overconfident in their defense of the bridge, not believing that anybody could cross over the bare iron chains under fire. However, the nationalist response simply took too long and it was so disorganized that it was not until the battalion outside the city was decimated that the reinforcement began to move out of the city. One of the reasons for the delay was that the nationalists did not believe that the 120 km to Luding City could be marched in such a short time, and in fact, many of nationalist commanders thought the battle at the suburb of Luding City was a case of misunderstanding and friendly fire amongst nationalist forces. After realizing the attacking force was indeed the enemy and not the reinforcements they hoped for, purportedly only after witnessing defeat of the battalion deployed in the suburb, the nationalist defenders inside the city were reluctant to leave the protection of the city wall and fortifications. Furthermore, the survivors of the battalion deployed outside the city wall greatly exaggerated the strength of the attacking communist force in order to make an excuse for their own failure after escaping back into the city. In order to prevent morale from dropping further, the nationalist commanders decided not to inform their soldiers about the incoming communist force other than for the battalion sent out, a decision they would later regret. The disorganized and slow response also created another disaster for the national defenders inside the city wall: unaware of the newly changed battle plans that were hastily put together, the soldiers of the remaining battalion began to flee, abandoning their posts, because they thought the other battalion deployed to reinforce the already destroyed battalion in the suburb were in fact escaping. The battalion on its way outside the city wall, in turn, seeing the remaining defenders starting abandoning their posts to flee and hearing the greatly exaggerated enemy from the survivors from the already destroyed battalion, also panicked and fled back into the city, abandoning their assigned mission. Taking advantage of the chaos, soldiers of the 7th company, 4th regiment of the 2nd division, 1st Chinese Red Army Corps successfully fought their way into Luding City at 4:00 p. m., suffering only a dozen fatalities along the way. By this time, the 2nd company of the same regiment on the western end of the bridge had already started their assault from the other side. The survivors of the 7th company fought their way directly toward the bridge, and successfully supported their comrades from the other side on the western bank of the Dadu River. After the assault team had crossed the bridge, and subsequent arrival of the main force of the 4th regiment, the battle ended at 6:00 p. m. with the bridge and the city firmly in the Red Army's hands.

Four hours after the communist victory, nationalist reinforcements arrived from the eastern bank of the Dadu River, and together with the survivors of the defenders who were scattered by the Red Army in earlier battles, the nationalists launched their attack from the eastern suburb of Luding City around 10:00 p. m. on the night of May 29, 1935. The 4th regiment of the 2nd division, 1st CRA Corps, expected a fierce battle between them and the nationalists, but instead, the battle was short lived. The nationalists either surrendered or escaped into the surrounding mountains almost as soon as the battle began, because the 1st regiment, 1st division, 1st CRA Corps on the eastern bank of Dadu River, led by commander Yang Dezhi (杨得志) and political commissar Li Lin (黎林) had also arrived, soon followed by the main force of the 1st division led by the Chinese Red Army Chief of the General Staff, Liu Bocheng, and the political commissar of the 1st corps, Nie Rongzhen, when the battle was supposed to continue. Red Army units on both banks of Dadu River had met at the Luding City area as Mao had planned beforehand.