Combat in the Xuzhou Vicinity Affects the Whole Situation; Strive to Fight Well[1]

(July 19, 1946)

Chen and Song, with information to Liu and Deng[2]:

The combat in the vicinity of Xuzhou affects the whole situation. If we fight well and wipe out the main force of Chiang Kai-shek’s troops advancing eastward, our army will be able to strike southward at the 99th and 58th Armies and other units,[3] cut the Xuzhou-Bengbu railway,[4] and, in coordination with the army of Liu and Deng, develop a new situation. The miscellaneous troops may also rise up against the civil war. If we do not fight well, we shall find ourselves in a difficult position in central Jiangsu and northern Huaihe. Therefore you must wait until the 88th and 28th Divisions[5] come out and advance to a point favorable to us, and then concentrate all our forces to wipe out one of them. After succeeding, wipe out the other. Once these two divisions are disposed of, we shall achieve an overall victory. What is your opinion?

Military Commission

Haowei

[1] This telegram was drafted by Mao Zedong for the Military Commission of the CPC Central Committee and addressed to Chen Yi, commander and concurrently political commissar of the Shandong Field Army, and Song Shilun, its chief of staff.

[2] Liu and Deng: Liu Bocheng and Deng Xiaoping, who were then respectively commander and political commissar of the Shanxi-Hebei-Shandong-Henan Field Army.

[3] By this time the 99th and 58th Armies of the Kuomintang army had been redesignated the Reorganized 69th and Reorganized 58th Divisions. The old designations are used here.

[4] The Xuzhou-Bengbu railway refers to the section of the present Beijing-Shanghai line between Xuzhou and Bengbu.

[5] Both divisions were reorganized divisions, equivalent to an army before reorganization.