Lesson 21: Resistance in the enemy's rear battlefield

Pingxingguan Great Victory

During the Battle of Shanghai, the Japanese invaded Shanxi and attempted to capture Taiyuan, and in September 1937, a part of the Japanese Itagaki Division marched to Pingxingguan. Pingxingguan is located in the northeast of Shanxi, with a dangerous terrain, easy to defend and difficult to attack, and is an important gateway to Taiyuan. The 15th Division of the 8th Route Army, led by Division Commander Lin Biao, set up a covert ambush in the area of Pingxingguan. When the Japanese entered the ambush circle with more than 1,000 men, the 8th Route Army opened fire from different directions. The Japanese were in a mess and were killed and wounded. The eight-way army rushed down and started a physical battle with the Japanese. After nearly a day of fierce fighting, the Japanese were all wiped out.

The Pingxingguan victory was the first victory achieved by the Chinese army since the National War of Resistance, shattering the myth that the Japanese were "invincible".

The establishment and development of anti-Japanese base areas

After the outbreak of the Total War of Resistance, the Eighth Route Army and the New Fourth Army advanced into the back of the enemy and established anti-Japanese base areas, turning the enemy's rear into the front line of the resistance. The anti-Japanese bases were established in Jinchaji, Jinsui, Jinjiyu, Shandong, and Southern Jiangsu. Yan'an, the capital of the Shaanxi-Ganjiang-Ningxia Border Region and the seat of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, became the strategic rear and command center of the post-enemy battlefield.

Under the leadership of the Communist Party of China, the soldiers and people of the base areas, with the main forces and local militias as the backbone and the masses as the basis, organized all forces and launched a mass people's guerrilla war. According to the characteristics of different terrains in different places, they adopted tunnel warfare, mine warfare, night attack warfare, "sparrow warfare" and other warfare methods to combat the Japanese army, so that the Japanese army was overwhelmed, exhausted and restless.

In order to consolidate the base areas and strive for victory in the war, the Chinese Communist Party formulated various policies and measures. The establishment of anti-Japanese democratic power in the base areas, the implementation of the land policy of rent reduction and interest reduction, and the development of production made the base areas a base for the long-term persistence and final victory of guerrilla warfare behind enemy lines.

The rear enemy battlefield and the front battlefield cooperated with each other to form the whole of China's anti-Japanese war.

Hundred Regiments Battle

In order to eliminate the anti-Japanese base areas, the Japanese army implemented the "cage policy", relying on roads and railroads to blockade and encroach on the anti-Japanese base areas.

In the second half of 1940, in order to crush the Japanese "sweep" and blockade of the anti-Japanese bases behind the enemy lines and to boost the morale of the resistance soldiers and civilians, the headquarters of the Eighth Route Army, under the command of Peng Dehuai, organized more than 100 regiments to launch a large-scale attack against the Japanese on a 2,000-km front in northern China. "Hundred Regiments Battle".

The main goal of this battle was to break the Japanese lines of communication and destroy the Japanese and fake strongholds on both sides of the enemy's lines of communication and in the anti-Japanese base areas. The Battle of Hundred Regiments lasted for several months and had brilliant results, which strongly combated the Japanese aggression, increased the prestige of the Communist Party and the Eighth Route Army, and boosted the confidence of the nation's military and people for victory in the war of resistance.

After the Japanese suffered a blow, the Japanese immediately organized heavy forces to the Eighth Route Army and the anti-Japanese base to carry out retaliatory "sweep", the Eighth Route Army then turned into the anti "sweep" warfare.（662words）