2. Battlefields and Opposing Generals

To be fair, the failure of the encirclement campaigns was not because Chiang's subordinates were incompetent fighters.

The KMT side did not lack for able fighters. Chiang had the “Eight Great Warriors”under him: He Yingqin, Qian Dajun, Gu Zhutong, Liu Zhi, Chen Jicheng, Chen Cheng, Jiang Dingwen and Zhang Zhizhong.

The CPC-led Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army was known to the Chinese as “the Zhu-Mao Army,” but few know that the Whampoa Academy forces led by the KMT used to be called “the Chiang-He Army.”

He Yingqin once ranked alongside Chiang. He was born in Nitang Village, Xingyi County, Guizhou. In 1906, a junior army school was opened in Guizhou which enrolled one top student per county within the province. The 16-year-old He Yingqin had the highest score in Xingyi and was thus admitted. On graduation he was recommended to Wuchang Army's Third Middle School for further schooling. In autumn of 1909, He was chosen as one of the 20 students from three middle schools of the field army to study at Tokyo Shimbu Gakko, a Japanese military preparatory academy.

He Yingqin had always had top grades in his class, but, unbeknownst to many, the Shimbu Gakko had a Chinese student with a similar record of high performance. It was Jiang Zhiqing, two classes above. In 1906, Jiang Zhiqing applied to the National Ground Forces Short-term School under the Army Department (later renamed Baoding Military Academy). There were more than 1,000 applicants for 60 places, including the 46 recommended by military schools across the country. That meant just 14 of the candidates could possibly win admission. On the basis of the admission exam, Jiang was selected and became one of the 14 in 1,000.

Jiang Zhiqing was Chiang Kai-shek (Jiang Jieshi in Mandarin). Kai-shek was his courtesy name.

The two were not acquainted while at Shimbu Gakko. Chiang, influenced by the modern tools of war, majored in artillery, while He, believing in the decisive nature of traditional infantry fighting, chose the infantry course. Both returned to China at the outbreak of the Revolution of 1911, and both served in the revolutionary forces under Chen Qimei, the military governor of Shanghai, with Chiang leading the fifth regiment and He serving in the training section of the governor's office. But they did not come across each other at the time.

That happened at the Whampoa Military Academy.

While the military academy was being built, He Yingqin was down on his luck.

On his return from Japan, He went back to his native province of Guizhou to carve out his future. He first won the favor and trust of Wang Dianlun, commander of the Guizhou Army, and later married the niece of Guizhou governor Liu Ruzhou. Associated with the two powerful men of Guizhou, He was riding high; a bright future was unfolding before him. The Guizhou Army at that time had three mixed brigades; He was appointed commander of the Fifth Mixed Brigade and then commander of the Guiyang Garrison.

But the good times were short-lived. Abrupt political change hit Guizhou in 1920, when Sun Jianfeng, commander of the army's special tasks regiment, launched a coup. He Yingqin was forced to resign from all his posts and expelled from Guizhou. He went to neighboring province of Yunnan.

But in Kunming, capital of Yunnan, he was the victim of an attempted assassination, hit by two gunshots, one in the chest, the other in his leg. Fortunately the chest wound was not fatal and his life was saved. He was hospitalized for half a year at a French hospital in Kunming. When still a child, He had set his heart on serving his country by joining the army. But his very first gunshot wound came from one of his own men; it left him reeling.

And his dream of a military career in Guizhou was shattered.

On discharge from hospital, He left for Shanghai immediately, where he stayed without occupation for nearly two years. With less than 10,000 yuan in reserve, he could hardly sustain a life of leisure indefinitely. He had to plan for his future. There were two options: either go to Guangzhou or to Beijing. But things were not encouraging in Guangzhou since Chen Jiongming's military takeover of the province and Sun Yat-sen's fall from power. On the other hand, he had no connections with the men of power among the northern warlords in Beijing either. But in the mid of his anxiety and distress he heard of the establishment of the Whampoa Military Academy with Chiang Kai-shek as its commandant. He knew Chiang not at all well but both were close to Wang Boling. He asked Wang to affect an introduction.

Actually, the KMT's Whampoa army should have been called the Chiang-Wang Army, not the Chiang-He Army.

Wang Boling and Chiang went back a very long way. At Baoding Military Academy, they both passed the selection test for further studies in Japan. They left for Japan together, and worked on the same major - artillery. In May 1916, Ju Zheng set up the Northeastern Army of the short-lived Chinese Revolutionary Party in Qingdao, Shandong, with Chiang Kai-shek serving as army headquarters' chief of staff and Wang Boling as staff officer. Later, when Chiang moved to Guangzhou to serve as chief of staff at the headquarters of Generalissimo Sun Yat-sen, he invited Wang to join him as senior staff officer. Later, Wang's name ranked second only to Chiang's on committees preparing for the founding of the Whampoa Military Academy and for the Academy's admission test. After the academy officially went into operation, Wang was immediately appointed director of the Major Generals' Training Department.

At the time, Chiang needed people for Whampoa and was using his network of classmate contacts from Japan days to scout for talent. On Wang Boling's recommendation, in his capacity as chairman of the preparatory committee he sent He Yingqin a telegram asking the latter to come to Guangzhou. On arrival, He Yingqin was immediately entrusted with important tasks at the academy, first taking charge of candidate selection, then serving as general instructor and concurrently director of the Teaching and Training Department. He soon became a big shot next only to Wang Boling.

History favors the prepared mind. He Yingqin's two bullet wounds and his switch-back career to date had made him ready to grab any opportunity history offered.

Why was the KMT Whampoa Army named “Chiang-He” not “Chiang-Wang”? The reason can be traced to the kind of man Wang Boling was.

Wang was Chiang's most trusted right-hand man in the Whampoa Academy, but he showed little interest in teaching. He often spent entire days in dining, wining, whoring, gambling and smoking opium in downtown Guangzhou. He was nowhere to be found when needed. He seemed totally oblivious to the critical or favorable point in history he stood at. At this juncture, and in his position, had he acted prudently and been a little more accessible when needed, history might have rewarded him substantially.

This is where He Yingqin differed from Wang Boling.

He Yingqin had no bad habits. He took the academy as his home, working industriously and conscientiously. He was available day and night whether on- or off-duty, respectfully accepting every assignment. As a result, Chiang begun to trust him more and more, assigning to him what he previously entrusted to Wang Boling. He Yingqin did not disappoint, leading his subordinates - military instructors including Liu Zhi, Gu Zhutong, Qian Dajun and Chen Jicheng - to accomplish brilliant work. Chiang was also happy that he had used the right person and they grew even closer. By the end of 1924, the National Revolutionary Army (NRA) of the KMT was established, with the first batch of Whampoa graduates grouped into two officer training regiments. Chiang appointed He as commander of the First Regiment and Wang as commander of the Second Regiment. He Yingqin's position in the KMT began to overtake Wang Boling's.

But it was performance in battle that definitively led to Chiang's focus shifting from Wang to He.

In January 1925, Chen Jiongming deployed troops in three routes to attack Guangzhou. The generalissimo's headquarters formed the United Eastern Expedition army to meet the rebels head-on. He Yingqin's First Officer Training Regiment marched forward along the Guangzhou-Kowloon Railway line and served as the main army formation to attack Danshui City. Wang Boling's Second Officer Training Regiment acted as the reserve force. It was the first real-life battle engagement for the Whampoa cadet troops. To calm his men's nerves, He led his troops in field manoeuvers on the way, marching only 5 or 10 kilometers a day. All his men thought they were in a live ammunition manoeuver. Consequently, they were courageous and relaxed in the battle at Danshui. They attacked before dawn, and stormed into the city at noon, destroying a whole defending brigade and capturing more than 1,000 rifles.

But this victory was not matched by Wang Boling's Second Officer Training Regiment. Wang was defeated outside Danshui by incoming enemy reinforcements. During the fight, Wang Boling turned tail in the face of danger, causing his troops to retreat immediately. Learning of the precarious situation outside Danshui, He Yingqin ordered his Second Battalion under the command of Liu Zhi out of the city on a counterattack. As it was at dusk, the enemy mistook the troops from the city as their own people fleeing the town. When they realized they were Whampoa cadet troops charging at them with flashing bayonets, they were taken by surprise and crumbled in disarray.

In his first great victory, He Yingqin led the First Regiment to take Danshui and rescued the Second Regiment. His fame soared.

The Danshui battle showed Chiang that Wang Boling could not be relied on to lead field combat, and he therefore replaced him with Qian Dajun, commander of the First Battalion under the First Regiment.

He Yingqin's military career was off to a good start.

For Wang Boling, however, this was a prologue to his resigning from military life, embarking on a life of indolence and finally devoting his life to studying Buddhism.

But it was the Battle of Mianhu that cemented He Yingqin's position in Chiang's regard.

This battle was crunch time for the Whampoa troops. On March 12, He's First Regiment met Chen Jiongming's main forces led by Lin Hu in mountainous land northwest of Mianhu. The fighting went on from daybreak to four in the afternoon. The Second Regiment, slow to move into position, came too late to attack the enemy's flank and rear, resulting in the enemy troops going all out to deal with the First Regiment. Facing an enemy 10 times more numerous than itself, the First Regiment was under great pressure. Both sides poured all their reserve forces onto the battlefield. By afternoon, He had lost one-third of his troops to death or injury, and his entire battle-line was tottering. Seeing the losses, a battalion commander cried himself hoarse. Several enemy units even charged towards the command post. He Yingqin's then secretary recalled:

“This life or death battle was a close run thing! Without Mr. He's resolve to put his own life on the line, it would have shaken the confidence of the whole regiment, and we were sure to be wiped out. Then the enemy would have used the momentum to attack the isolated Second Regiment, which would then have been crushed one by one. It didn't stand a chance. With those two regiments gone, everything achieved in years of training at the Whampoa Academy would be destroyed; and who knows what the future of the revolution would be then.”

He Yingqin was aware that it was a kill or be killed fight; his only option was to fight to the bitter end. He ordered his men to hold their ground no matter how heavy the losses; no retreat whatsoever was allowed. In the meantime, he personally led the machine-gun platoon of his guard team to hit back at the attacking enemies. The two sides locked in tangled combat, fighting ferociously with no quarter given. Fortunately, by five in the afternoon Qian Dajun's Second Regiment succeeded in detouring to the enemy's rear to attack their headquarters. Gradually, the enemy forces began to give way and were forced to retreat under cover of darkness.

Of course, the key to the final victory lay in the combat capacity of the Whampoa troops, particularly of the First Officer Training Regiment. The enemy's reserve force, a brigade led by Xu Ji of the Guangdong Army, arrived to give support, but was crushed within half an hour. The First Regiment remained rock-solid regardless of the severe loss of lives.

This battle established the reputation for the heroic fighting skills of the Whampoa cadets, a reputation that would continue to grow.

On the day of the battle, Chiang Kai-shek and his Soviet military advisor Galen witnessed events from He Yingqin's command post. Chiang said afterwards, “During the Mianhu battle, 1,000-plus men of the First Regiment faced over 10,000 elite enemy troops. It was dangerous in the extreme. Suppose they had been crushed. Not only would the KMT army created by Sun Yat-sen have been wiped out, but the cradle of revolution too would have been left unprotected. The battle happened on the day after Sun's passing. It was surely his soul in heaven quietly helping us to success.”

Defeat in that battle would have meant the total destruction of the KMT; which in turn would mean no Chiang Kai-shek of later days. Therefore, March 12 became a kind of anniversary celebrated by Chiang and He as a shared life-or-death moment.

It was after this battle that the “Chiang-He” combination became widely known.

He Yingqin's performance at Mianhu left a deep impression on Chiang. But for He Yingqin himself, his greatest source of pride was the Battle of Longtan.

In August 1927, Chiang Kai-shek stepped down from the political arena for the first time. Sun Chuanfang led an attack on Nanjing, guarded at the time only by the Garrison Division and the 21st Division. Unable to check Sun's offensive, the troops scattered and retreated to the Qilin Gate after three days' fighting. He Yingqin was fully aware that defeat in that battle would have multiple consequences: It would allow Sun Chuanfang to retake the five provinces of Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Fujian, Jiangxi and Anhui; that would prevent Yan Xishan in the north joining the Northern Expedition; and it could eventually put a question mark over whether the Expedition troops could return to Guangdong to re-group. He therefore personally led the Special Tasks Battalion of fewer than 300 men to the frontline. Seeing them arrive, the scattered defenders began to stabilize and put up a fight. Shouting “Here comes the Commander! What are you afraid of? Charge back!” they recaptured Dongyang Town. As it happened, Bai Chongxi, on his way back from a fund-raising visit to Shanghai, was held up at Wuxi Railway Station owing to damage to the track. Using the station's public telephone he directed troops stationed in the Shanghai-Hangzhou area in a counter-offensive. Now attacked from both front and rear, Sun's offensive was foiled.

Longtan was critical to the outcome of the Northern Expedition. Sun's 50,000 troops were eliminated and 40,000 rifles captured. He received a banner bearing the words “defending the party and the nation.”

He Yingqin was careful and prudent in directing operations. His vision and brainpower were brilliantly exhibited during the tangled fighting between the new warlords of the KMT. The Fourth Group Army of the Guangxi faction, a major problem for Chiang, was almost routed by He Yingqin.

In March 1929, Chiang took on the Guangxi clique in war, appointing He Yingqin as chief of the general staff to put down the rebel Guangxi Army. He devised strategies for Chiang that resulted in defeat for Guangxi. In November the same year, Zhang Fakui (of Guangdong) joined forces with the Guangxi Army against Chiang. He Yingqin took up the job of suppressing the alliance. Then, in December, shortly after the Zhang-Guangxi alliance was put down, Tang Shengzhi in Zhengzhou of Henan and Shi Yousan in Anhui launched offensives against Chiang. He Yingqin went to Wuhan to take charge of operations against Tang. In January 1930, Tang issued an open telegram announcing his resignation. He Yingqin was awarded the Order of the Sacred Tripod, First Class.

In May 1930, the Central Plains War broke out. While Chiang led all of his main forces north to fight against Feng Yuxiang and Yan Xishan, He Yingqin took command of defending Wuhan, directing troops from different backgrounds and under different commanders put together for the fight, to deal with the crack forces of the Guangxi Army, a formidable force of brave and seasoned fighters. Having occupied Changsha, they were pressing forward towards Wuhan. In this intense situation, He Yingqin squatted on the floor of the operations room, surrounded by war maps, racking his formidable brain and marking the maps in all colors. He worked out a solution without having to call Chiang for reinforcements.

He ordered Xia Douyin's troops to defend Yueyang to the death, and drive all available trains to Wuhan or to blow them up on the spot. He then ordered He Jian's scattered troops to retreat to western Hunan rather than to Wuhan. His intention was twofold: to prevent Wuhan from being affected by the scattered troops; and, to threaten the flank of the Guangxi Army and deter them from charging straight in. Finally he ordered the divisions led by Jiang Guangding and Cai Tingkai, the two elite units of the Guangdong Army, to pursue and attack the Guangxi Army's tail; he also ordered the Hunan Army led by Li Yunheng to support Jiang and Cai by making a pincer attack on Hengyang, a city of strategic importance to the Guangxi Army.

With Hengyang captured, Li Zongren and Bai Chongxi's Guangxi Army were forced to hit back at the Guangdong Army. He Jian's troops therefore took the opportunity to advance from western Hunan and attack Changsha. In addition, another two routes under the command of He Yingqin advanced on the Guangxi Army from the east and north. During the battle at Hengyang, the Guangxi Army suffered a defeat unprecedented since its establishment; only a few troops managed to escape from the converging attacks maneuvered by He Yingqin. Although not entirely wiped out, it emerged a shadow of its former self.

Having finished off the Guangxi Army without asking for reinforcement from Chiang Kai-shek, He Yingqin actually managed to help Chiang by deploying three divisions to the area along the Tianjin-Pukou Railway to reinforce Chiang's main forces in the northern theater.

Beyond any shadow of doubt, the “can-do” He Yingqin fully deserved his top place among Chiang's “Eight Great Warriors.”

So when Chiang deployed forces in an attempt to encircle the Red Army, the name of He Yingqin was the first to spring to mind.

Before the Central Plains War came to an end, Chiang sent a coded telegram to Nanjing from the Henan battlefront, ordering the immediate public release of the notice appointing He Yingqin as commander-in-chief of the Hubei-Hunan-Jiangxi suppression campaign.

He Yingqin was undefeated in the wars against the new warlords, but his unblemished record did not survive encounters with the Red Army; he suffered one defeat after another in his three encirclement campaigns.

He Yingqin was made commander-in-chief for the Second Encirclement Campaign. His plan was to “go ahead steadily, striking sure blows and consolidating at every step,”and to deploy 11 divisions and four armies with a total strength of 200,000 to form a 400-kilometer-long arch around the Red Army. In the event, the Red Army swept them back for more than 350 kilometer, and they lost some 30,000 men and 20,000 rifles.

In the Third Encirclement Campaign, He Yingqin was frontline commander-in-chief. He ordered his troops to drive straight in but failed to locate the Red Army's main forces, wandering about like a blind man on a blind horse. Before he realized it, 17 of his regiments had been wiped out and more than 20,000 of his men were prisoners of the Red Army.

In the Fourth Encirclement Campaign, He acted as commander-in-chief of the Jiangxi-Guangdong-Fujian forces, actually all the troops encircling the Central Soviet Area. But his three principal divisions were destroyed, and two division commanders captured. Even the Eighth Division, a crack unit of Chiang's, suffered overwhelming defeat. The result threw Chiang Kai-shek into a violent rage. As a warning to others, he dismissed Chen Cheng from his post of frontline commander-in-chief. He sighed, “This is the cruelest setback of all, a pain like no other in life.”

He Yingqin returned to Nanjing with a pretext, and took no further part in this kind of encirclement. Recalling the battles with the Red Army and Chiang's wrathful reprimand, the words “cruelest setback of all, a pain like no other” could have applied equally to him.

Of the “Eight Great Warriors,” Liu Zhi and Gu Zhutong were the two most trusted of He Yingqin, and were often referred to as his left and right arms.

There were two stories about Gu Zhutong's involvement with the Communists.

The first time was when Gu, as chief commander of the North Route Army, led the main KMT forces in an offensive against the Central Soviet Area during the Fifth Encirclement Campaign. They first took Lichuan, cutting off the Central Soviet's links with Soviet bases in the Fujian-Zhejiang-Jiangxi border area. Then Gu's troops inflicted heavy casualties on the Red Army's Third Corps and Seventh Corps at Xuwan, and on the First Corps and Ninth Corps in the battle of Daxiongguan Pass. They went on to attack Guangchang, Jianning and Gulonggang, fought a bloody battle at Gaohunao and Wannianting and finally captured Shicheng, forcing the Red Army to retreat and start the Long March. After the Red Army broke through the encirclement and set out on the march, the nine divisions under Xue Yue, Wu Qiwei and Zhou Hunyuan who were in hot pursuit of the retreating Red Army all belonged to the North Route Army of Gu Zhutong.

The second related to the South Anhui Incident (also known as the New Fourth Army Incident) which happened in January 1941 during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression. Chiang Kai-shek estimated that it would take at least a month and possibly as long as two or three months to wipe out the 9,000-strong crack forces of the New Fourth Army under the command of Ye Ting and Xiang Ying. In fact, the battle only lasted a week. The result had something to do with mistakes made by Xiang and Ying, but it also had much to do with Gu Zhutong's smart planning and command know-how.

Whereas Gu's account with the CPC had two main cases, Liu Zhi had at least three.

The first had its origins in the Zhongshan Warship Incident in 1926 when Liu served as commander of the Second Division of the National Revolutionary Army (NRA). When Chiang addressed a gathering of his garrison force in Guangzhou, Liu followed up by reading out a list of Communists to be arrested, and immediately detained every CPC representative and CPC member in the Second Division and the navy. That night Bao Huiseng questioned why he was doing this. Liu answered, “I'm not entirely sure. I just follow what the Commandant says; if he orders something done, that's what I do.”

The second went back to the Shanghai Massacre of April 12, 1927. Before ordering the purge of Communists, Chiang asked Bai Chongxi, the garrison commander of Shanghai, how many troops he would need. Bai answered, “You can move Xue Yue's First Division out of Shanghai. If you leave me with Liu Zhi's Second Division and Zhou Fengchi's 26th Army that will be plenty.” Both Chiang and Bai regarded Liu Zhi as the staunchest opponent of Communists. The Second Division soon moved in, replacing the First Division stationed between Zhabei Arsenal and Wusongkou.

The third came about in June 1932 during the Fourth Encirclement Campaign against the communist base in the Hubei-Henan-Anhui border area. Liu Zhi was deputy commander-in-chief of the Central Route Army (Chiang himself was commander-in-chief). Liu directed six columns of troops and a general reserve force, totaling 16 divisions plus two more brigades to attack and capture Xinji and Jinjiazhai, the heart of CPC's Hubei-Hunan-Anhui base area. His battle tactics were: “deploying forces in depth, pushing forward in parallel, consolidating at every step, and closing in to exterminate.” Chiang was so delighted that he renamed Xinji in Liu Zhi's honor, calling it “Jingfu County” after Liu's courtesy name. Similarly, Jinjiazhai was renamed “Lihuang County” after Wei Lihuang, commander of the Sixth Column under Liu Zhi.

As a matter of fact, it should have been the troops of Chen Jicheng, another of Chiang's “Eight Great Warriors,” to attack Jinjiazhai.

Chen Jicheng served under Liu Zhi for years. At the time of the Zhongshan Warship Incident in 1926, he was commander of the Fourth Regiment under Liu Zhi's Second Division. He ordered all the officers and soldiers of his regiment to assemble on the northern parade ground, where he disarmed and detained CPC representatives, political workers, CPC members and Communist Youth League members. Later during the Fourth Encirclement Campaign against CPC's Hubei-Henan-Anhui base, he commanded the Second Column under Liu Zhi's Central Route Army, directing four divisions on major assaults of the Red forces. Chen's troops seized Huang'an on August 13, Xinji in early September, and Shangcheng on September 14, all three places located in the core area of the Hubei-Henan-Anhui base. Their progress was impeded by the tenacious resistance of the Red Army at Jinjiazhai, therefore giving Wei Lihuang an opportunity to seize Jinjiazhai by taking a shortcut. Otherwise, Chiang Kai-shek would have named Jinjiazhai “Jicheng County” and not “Lihuang County.”

On account of Chen Jicheng's total commitment and willingness to fight to the last, Chiang had him transferred to participate in the Fifth Encirclement Campaign against the Central Soviet Area. In November 1933, Chen led his Third Column of troops to ambush positions in the areas of Yangxin and Zijinshan. The Third Division of the Red Army's Ninth Corps fell into the trap, and lost two-thirds of its troops. In April 1934, Chen was appointed by Chiang as commander-in-chief of suppression operations in the Hunan-Hubei-Jiangxi border area. Chen's troops besieged the headquarters of the CPC Hunan-Hubei-Jiangxi Provincial Committee in the mountainous region of Longmen. After several failed attempts to break through the blockade, the majority of the 1,000-plus headquarters staff and troops lost their lives.

After the Red Army finally broke through the encirclement and set out on the Long March, Chiang named Chen Jicheng a member of the Kuomintang's central executive committee.

While Liu Zhi conquered Xinji, location of the Hubei-Henan-Anhui Soviet headquarters, it was Jiang Dingwen who captured Ruijin, capital of the Central Soviet Area.

In the war history of the NRA, Jiang Dingwen was rated a “brave and able warrior,”a man of ability and courage. But it was the Soviet advisor Galen and not Chiang Kai-shek who first discovered his qualities. At a field training exercise of Whampoa cadets, General Galen fired a string of tactical questions at Jiang Dingwen, then commander of a cadet company. Chiang was in a sweat for Jiang, but the latter answered readily and fluently. Galen turned to Chiang, saying, “You can put this man in an important position.” These words laid the foundation for the rapid development of Jiang's military career.

Although Jiang had been discovered by Galen, he was not soft in dealing with the Soviet advisors. During the Zhongshan Warship Incident, his Fifth Regiment surrounded the residence of the Soviet advisors and also the Guangzhou-Hong Kong Strike Committee, disarming the guards of the Soviet mission and the strike committee members.

During the first Eastern Expedition, the Battle of Mianhu was a life-or-death engagement for the Whampoa Army. Jiang Dingwen was then commander of the First Battalion of the Officer Training Regiment. In a fierce assault on the main force of Lin Hu's troops (under Guangdong warlord Chen Jiongming), Jiang was hit by a bullet in the chest and was sent to hospital for treatment. Chiang immediately gave him a special reward of 5,000 yuan. In his foreword for the address book of Whampoa's first graduates, Chiang wrote, “Battalion Commander Jiang Dingwen and a dozen others are still in a critical condition, poised between life and death.”

He Yingqin was not convinced that Jiang could be so dauntless, and suspected that Jiang was hit by a stray bullet when backing away from the enemy. A check showed that the bullet had penetrated from the left side of his chest, which could be interpreted as meaning he could have been wounded when advancing or retreating. Only Chiang was willing to believe in his loyalty and bravery. Accordingly, while still recovering in hospital, Jiang was promoted to lieutenant colonel deputy commander of the First Officer Training Regiment, and soon after that to commander of the Fifth Regiment of the Second Division.

But the Red Army Jiang Dingwen was sent to wipe out struck fear into him, despite his heroic valor.

In June 1931, Chiang Kai-shek launched the Third Encirclement Campaign against the Central Soviet Area. Jiang Dingwen, as commander in chief of the Fourth Corps, led the Ninth Division and 52nd Division to invade from the Nancheng area. Chiang's plan was to corner the Red Army on the southern bank of the Ganjiang River and then wipe it out. At the end of July, he found that the Red Army's main force had moved to Xingguo and immediately ordered Jiang Dingwen's troops to quick march towards Xingguo. The Red Army disguised a small part of its troops as the main force and feinted towards the Ganjiang River, allowing the actual main force, during the night of August 4, to thread through the 20-kilometer gap between the troops of Jiang Dingwen and Cai Tingkai, out of their encirclement. When Jiang Dingwen turned around and attempted to hem in the Red Army gathered east of Junfu, the 27th Brigade of his Ninth Division was hit by a surprise attack by the Red Army at Laoyingpan. He immediately ordered the 26th Brigade to the rescue, but the reinforcements came too late to save them because a mountain between them was occupied by the Red Army. After several hours of fierce fighting, the 27th Brigade was wiped out, and the commander of the 81st Regiment Wang Ming was taken prisoner. As the Ninth Division was Jiang's basic fighting unit, its loss stabbed him to the heart. Yet for Jiang, even more problems were in store; his 52nd Division was attacked by Red Army at Fangshiling on September 15. The entire division was wiped out, and even its commander Han Deqin was among those taken prisoner. But Han was a wily old fox; he concealed his true identity, disguised himself as an injured soldier and escaped by good fortune. Jiang himself was surrounded on three sides by the Red Army at Huangtuao. Luckily Cai Tingkai and his troops arrived in time to rescue him, lifting the siege, and settling things a little.

In previous operations he commanded, Jiang Dingwen had many easy wins and incurred only modest losses. But in the First Encirclement Campaign in which he was involved, he narrowly avoided being captured and this really stung him. Later he made several successful attacks against Fang Zhimin's 10th Red Army in northeast Jiangxi, and won praise from Chiang Kai-shek for proposing the tactic of “consolidating at every step and pressing forward steadily,” but his zeal was not what it once was. He became wary about taking on the Red Army and frequently made excuses to leave the front to live in Shanghai. He told his close friends in private, “From now on, I'm going to accumulate a million [in money] to while away some 20 years in Shanghai, to the end of my days.”

Jiang thought of leaving the front for the rear, but Chiang would not hear of it. Instead he assigned Jiang to the frontline in the Fifth Encirclement Campaign as a capable general, and had him do two things he never expected to handle.

First, he put down the “Fujian Mutiny.” On November 21, 1933, Chen Mingshu, Cai Tingkai and other officers of the 19th Route Army launched a “People's Government” in Fuzhou, and called for the overthrow of Chiang Kai-shek. Chiang ordered Jiang Dingwen as commander-in-chief of the left route army to head for Fujian to suppress the rebels.

Jiang got on well with both Chen and Cai. During the Shanghai Incident, Chen Mingshu had been commander-in-chief of the left-wing army defending the Beiping-Shanghai Railway while Jiang Dingwen was commander-in-chief of the right-wing army defending the Songhu Railway. They had worked together well leading the resistance against the Japanese. Moreover, Cai Tingkai had saved Jiang's life in the Third Encirclement Campaign. According to Jiang, had Cai not gone all out to rescue him at Huangtuao, he would long since have been a prisoner of the forces under the command of Zhu De and Mao Zedong.

But Jiang now led a force of 150,000 troops to fight his comrade-in-arms in their fight against the Japanese invaders, the friend in need who had saved his life.

If you think that Jiang would not carry out Chiang's order to the letter because of personal sentiment, Jiang Dingwen would not be the man he was. His treatment of Soviet advisors was one such example, and Chen Mingshu and Cai Tingkai were no exception. The day that he received the order, Jiang, in his headquarters, set to work on deployments to wipe out the 19th Route Army and overthrow the Fujian People's Government. What he most feared was that the Red Army would support the 19th Route Army. So when he later heard that no such cooperation was happening, he was greatly relieved and unleashed his hand. While the attacks were ongoing, he bought over Mao Weishou, commander of the 19th Route Army's 61st Division, who changed sides in Quanzhou. He also paid local armed forces, ruffians and hooligans to make trouble in the rear of the 19th Route Army. The 19th Route Army was thus routed at one go.

Second, he attacked and occupied Ruijin, the Red capital.

Following the end of the Fujian Mutiny in February 1934, Jiang Dingwen's forces were renamed the east route army, and moved from Fujian to attack the Central Soviet Area.

Things were off to a bad start. On the first route, Chen Mingren's 80th Division was surrounded and attacked by the Red Army as they entered Shaxian County. Almost half of its officers and soldiers were killed or injured, and its supplies and equipment suffered great loss. On the second route, the Eighth Brigade of Li Yutang's Third Division was wiped out by the Red Army in Liancheng, and the units directly under the division also suffered losses. Exasperated, Jiang Dingwen went to the front to personally supervise military operations, and cabled urgently to Chiang at the Nanchang headquarters for help. Chiang Kai-shek immediately had Gu Zhutong flown to western Fujian to help Jiang replan the battle dispositions. Chen Mingren was removed from his position and Li Yutang was demoted to the rank of captain, but retained his division commander post to “render meritorious service.”

Most military engagements went well for Jiang, but this was not at all the case against the Red Army. He suffered loss after loss until the Red Army started the Long March, and when he finally captured Ruijin the city was empty.

The Red Army had set out on the Long March a month earlier.

There were three more “Great Warriors.”

Qian Dajun was a seasoned and resourceful warrior. Leading his troops in battle, he inflicted great damage on the Nanchang uprising troops. When he moved to serve as a high-ranking advisor, director of the Nanchang headquarters of the Military Commission, he was the brain behind Chiang's battle plan for the Fourth Encirclement Campaign.

Of the “Eight Great Warriors,” seven participated in the fights against the Red Army. The exception was Zhang Zhizhong. Zhang did not fight the Red Army during the Agrarian Revolutionary War, and in the Anti-Japanese War period, he was on friendly terms with the CPC. During the Liberation War (1946-1949) he was called a “general of peace.” Although he did not engage the CPC on the battlefield, as Chiang Kai-shek's chief representative at the negotiating table, his rhetoric was powerful and aggressive when he crossed swords with the Communists. The minutes of the Chongqing Negotiations in 1945 provide clear evidence of this: On the matter of reducing the number of CPC troops, Zhang Zhizhong battled hard, refusing to give an inch.

Otherwise, he would not be counted among Chiang's “Eight Great Warriors.”

The last of the eight was Chen Cheng.

Mao Zedong was never heard to praise any KMT general; but Zhou Enlai, the most senior leader in the Military Department and the Cental Military Commission, once spoke highly of Chen Cheng and Hu Zongnan.

In July 1936, in conversation with the American writer Edgar Snow at Baijiaping in northern Shaanxi, Zhou singled out Chen Cheng as a “smart tactician” and “one of the most talented commanders” among the KMT's high-ranking officers.

Chen was the one who did most harm to the Red Army in the encirclement offensives against the Central Soviet Area.

In terms of seniority, he ranked second to last among Chiang's “Eight Great Warriors” of Whampoa.

When Whampoa was established in 1924, Chen had the rank of captain, but was waiting for an official post. Most of the eight were already well on their way: He Yingqin was a major general chief instructor; Qian Dajun was a lieutenant colonel weapons instructor; Gu Zhutong and Chen Jicheng were lieutenant colonel tactics instructors; and Liu Zhi was major tactics instructor; Zhang Zhizhong, a slightly later arrival, was appointed as colonel deputy leader of the Third-Intake Students Unit. Jiang Dingwen, as first lieutenant leader of a first-intake student platoon was the only one with a military rank lower than Chen Cheng's.

But He Yingqin and Chen Cheng were the core figures of Chiang's “Eight Great Warriors.” Although the KMT army leadership was often called Chiang-He on China's mainland, in Taiwan it was called Chiang-Chen. As a matter of fact, the shift away from He began with his slipping away when things got too hot to handle. He slipped back to Nanjing after failing in three encirclements in the south, causing Chiang to yell at him “If you fear death then don't put on the uniform!” Later, while he was chairing the Beiping Military Committee in North China, he slipped back to Nanjing again because the pressure from the Japanese was too much for him. Chen replaced He Yingqin at the core, but it was only after Chiang fled to Taiwan that the term Chiang-Chen became publicly known.

In a stage performance, the star performer is often the last to appear on stage.

Of the eight warriors, Chen Cheng was always Chiang's last resort, sent in to clear up the mess and crack the hard nut that others could not handle. Chiang would even get Chen to bear disgrace on his behalf where he himself was unwilling to lose face.

During the Fourth Encirclement Campaign in early 1933, Chen Cheng was commander of the Central Route Army. Although He Yingqin had the title of commander-in-chief of the entire campaign, the main forces were under Chen's charge, and he often reported directly to Chiang, bypassing He. He Yingqin could do nothing about it. Chen met with initial setbacks: At the end of February, his 52nd Division and 59th Division were crushed by the Red Army in southern Yihuang, and both commanders - Li Ming of the 52nd Division and Chen Shiji of the 59th Division - were captured. In March, when Chen Cheng ordered the troops of Luo Zhuoying and Wu Qiwei to drive straight in to attack Guangchang, the 11th Division was hemmed in and crushed. This division was an elite unit of Chiang's Whampoa clique, the unit where Chen Cheng had developed and thrived. It had never lost a battle before. Its Commander Xiao Qian, over-confident in his unit's fighting capacity, insisted on putting up a foolhardy fight despite Luo Zhuoying's warning about the unfavorable terrain and the reported possibility of a siege by the Red Army's main force, as reported by the scouts. In the end, the division was almost completely destroyed.

On their way east to Huangpi from Le'an, Luo Zhuoying's troops were intercepted and attacked by Red Army troops, suffering heavy casualties.

These battles were waged generally in accordance with Chiang's own instructions, including the battle that Commander Xiao Qian insisted on fighting. Although Chen Cheng kept Chiang informed before and after each battle, Chiang did not step up and take any responsibility for the defeats.

On April 10, 1933, the Military Commission of the KMT issued a decision: Central Route Army Commander Chen Cheng was demoted to one rank lower and had a serious demerit recorded against him for “arrogance and acting on his own, not following the top leader's intention;” for “poor leadership and lack of resolve;” Army Commander Luo Zhuoying was dismissed from his post but was allowed to retain his position to prove himself in future performances; Commander of the 11th Division Xiao Qian had a serious demerit put on record for “being arrogant and negligence.”

Chairman of the Military Commission Chiang Kai-shek took disciplinary action against a number of subordinates but washed his own hands of responsibility for “a pain like no other in life” as he put it. Chen Cheng was scapegoated, the target of criticism from He Yingqin, Xiong Shihui and others; he apologized with head down, almost chin to chest, uttering “feeling terribly ashamed” and “should take the blame,” and other abject phrases.

Chen Cheng knew when to eat humble pie and when to hold his head high. The start of his military life was quite unusual. According to official records from Taiwan, in 1918, the 21-year-old Chen Cheng had graduated from Hangzhou Sports School, but was still feeling his way searching for a future, when Du Zhiyuan, his elder townsman who had been elected to the National Assembly of the Beiyang government, passed through Hangzhou on his way north to take up his post in Beijing. Chen was introduced to Du who found the young man steady and courteous but with high aspirations, not ready to accept mediocrity. So he took Chen along with him to Beijing. In 1919, the May 4th Movement broke out there. There was no red-blooded patriotic youth who did not want to save the nation, and Chen Cheng was right among them. Du Zhiyuan sought the help of others to recommend Chen Cheng for the entrance examination to the Baoding Military Academy. Because of the great many applicants, the academy set rigid enrollment requirements. After the initial examination a shortlist of 40 candidates was produced. A second test cut the 40 to a final three for enrollment. Chen Cheng was one of the three.

The officially revised orthodox history naturally presents Chen as extraordinarily outstanding.

But Chen Yingdong, the English-language secretary of Chen Cheng, gave a different version: That year, a group of townsmen saw Du Zhiyuan off at the railway station on his way to Beijing. Since many of Du's bodyguards came from Qingtian in Zhejiang, Chen Cheng's hometown, Chen got so engrossed in chatting with them that he forgot to get off the train in time and it was purely through muddle and accident that he was taken to Beijing. On inquiry, Du learned that Chen Cheng was also from Qingtian and furthermore, was the son of Chen Xiwen who passed the imperial examination at county level at the same time Du himself; he therefore allowed Chen to stay. Later, Du asked the president of the Baoding Military Academy Qu Tongfeng - the two belonged to the same Anhui group of the Beiyang Army - to recommend Chen Cheng for the entrance exam for the academy's eighth artillery intake. But Chen was rejected by the academy on the basis of his short stature and low test scores. Finally Du turned for help to Wei Zonghan, the chief examiner and director in charge of military academies at the Army Department of the Beiyang government. Chen was put on the waiting list.

These intricacies disclosed by Chen Yingdong show that authorized history is not necessarily the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

Chen was always loyal to Chiang Kai-shek. He would part ways with anyone at odds with Chiang no matter how close they had been.

The first such person was Deng Yanda.

Deng Yanda and Chen Cheng were very close originally. In 1922, as ordered by Sun Yat-sen, Deng went to Shanghai on a military talent-spotting mission. Among those recruited was Chen Cheng. Chen followed Deng south to Guangzhou. Deng served as commander of the Third Regiment of the Guangdong Army's First Division which guarded Generalissimo Sun Yat-sen's residence in Guangzhou while Chen commanded the regiment's Third Company. In May 1924, when Sun set up the Whampoa Military Academy, Deng was deputy director of the Instructors Department and concurrently chief leader of the enlisted students unit. Chen Cheng was taken into the academy too, appointed special aide with the rank of captain.

At the first crossroads in Chen Cheng's life, Du Zhiyuan was the guide. At the second and third turning points, it was Deng Yanda.

The second person was Yan Zhong.

Yan Zhong's influence on Chen Cheng's character was huge. While Chen was a company commander in the Third Regiment of the First Division, Yan was a battalion commander. Later, after Deng Yanda took up his post at Whampoa Military Academy, Yan went there too, initially as a tactics instructor, but soon succeeding Deng as the chief leader of the enlisted students unit. Later, as director of the Training Department, he transferred Chen Cheng to take charge of the department's artillery section. Just before the KMT's National Revolutionary Army left Guangdong to launch the Northern Expedition, it set up its general headquarters. Yan was transferred again to command the 21st Division, and Chen Cheng moved with him, promoted from artillery section chief to commander of the division's 63rd Regiment.

Yan Zhong was Chen's direct superior and close friend through their years together in the Guangdong Army, Whampoa Academy and the KMT army. Yan expected great things of Chen, and was strict in supervising and mentoring him. He kept a daily diary. One entry reads: “Chen Cheng came to visit me, and we chatted freely for two hours.... He must be the person to save China in future.” This clearly shows how highly Yan regarded Chen.

But when Deng and Yan went against Chiang, Chen parted company with them.

Prior to the Shanghai Massacre of April 12, 1927, Yan Zhong resigned his post and placed the 21st Division under the charge of Chen Cheng. Chiang Kai-shek called Chen in and asked where he stood on the domestic situation. Chen simply answered, “I shall absolutely follow you, Commander-in-chief Chiang.”

Chiang had his answer. On April 11, just one day before the massacre, Chen Cheng was appointed commander of the 21st Division.

There are different accounts as to how Chen Cheng became acquainted with Chiang Kai-shek.

One version goes like this: While at Whampoa, Chen Cheng returned to the school after enjoying himself downtown. Unable to fall asleep, he got up and read by lamplight. Chiang was making a patrol that night and, checking the source of the light, saw Chen Cheng reading the much underlined and marked The Three Principles of the People by Sun Yat-sen. Chiang was deeply impressed.

The second version goes: Chen Cheng went to downtown Guangzhou for a night out. Very early next day he took the first ferry back to the academy and was exercising on the horizontal bar when Chiang happened to make an early morning patrol of the campus. Chiang found the book The Three Principles of the People on the ground next to the horizontal bar. He leafed through it, noting that the pages were marked with dots, circles and small Chinese characters. Deeply impressed, he praised Chen for his careful reading.

Actually the two versions do not vary that much. They share similar details: the annotated The Three Principles of the People ; and the return to school after leisure time in Guangzhou. They differ only in the timing (mid-night vs. early morning) and the activity (reading vs. exercise). If we have only those two accounts to choose between, the second is the more plausible, since Chiang Kai-shek did not live on the campus at that time. His residence was at some distance from the academy, and it seems implausible that Chiang would be patrolling at that hour of the night. But he was an early riser, so it was quite possible for him to arrive at the school very early in the morning.

But the two actually met before the founding of Whampoa.

In May 1923, Captain Chen Cheng, in charge of the guard company at the generalissimo's residence, followed Sun Yat-sen on an expedition to Xijiang. During a battle with Feng Baochu's troops at Zhaoqing, Chen was injured by a bullet in the chest. While Chen was hospitalized for treatment, Chiang, the dashing chief of staff at the Generalissimo's headquarters, arrived in Zhaoqing. He took the opportunity to visit the hospital and comfort the injured. So the first time Chen met Chiang was in his sickbed. From then on till his death in Taiwan in 1965, Chen never once changed his political stand of following Chiang Kai-shek.

Chen Cheng himself was a conflicted soul. Politically, he was extremely loyal to Chiang; emotionally, he could not entirely sever his friendship with Deng and Yan.

When Chiang ordered the arrest of Deng Yanda, Chen knew perfectly well that Deng was hiding in Shanghai's International Settlement, but he did not report it and secretly tipped off Deng about the news. Later when Deng was captured and executed by Chiang, Chen was sad for quite some time.

After resigning, Yan Zhong lived in seclusion at Litoujian on Mount Lushan, possessing only a three-room house and in very reduced circumstances. Chen often helped out in secret. Whenever there was a chance, he would put in a good word for Yan Zhong with Chiang. After the September 18th Incident of 1931, the Tianjin-based Ta Kung Pao carried a feature article on Yan Zhong's secluded life on Mount Lushan, criticizing Chiang for forsaking the great Northern Expedition soldier at a time of national crisis, leaving him unused. Chen Cheng took the opportunity and went together with Chen Bulei to persuade Chiang to reinstate Yan Zhong. He himself hurried off to Mount Lushan to urge Yan to return to the service.

Staying on terms with people loyal to Chiang and with those who opposed him was a political approach that Chen Cheng figured out for himself.

This approach, when applied by Chen Cheng to commanding battlefield operations and training troops, became his particular care for the feelings and needs of the people, military and civilians alike.

Chen Cheng was different from Chiang Kai-shek and He Yingqin in that both Chiang and He became enrolled in the academy on their own merits and graduated with distinction, whereas Chen did not. Without Du Zhiyuan's repeated help, he would have had to return home and become a physical education instructor.

So his military attainments came mostly from his later battlefield practice. His abilities in battle could hardly be copied by other KMT generals. Indeed, many of his moves did not appear in the infantry exercise manual. Time off was unknown to him.

He always thought highly of the CPC's political work.

The 21st Division was in fact greatly influenced by the CPC. When the division set out from Guangdong on the Northern Expedition, Commander Yan Zhong raised the slogan “Officers should identify with the soldiers, soldiers with civilians, and civilians with the revolution.” This was to be the code of conduct for the division's officers and soldiers. Chen observed the code himself and ordered it followed by the whole regiment. All officers below company level carried carbines on their shoulders during the march, and ate and lived together with soldiers. In addition to enforcing rigorous discipline, wherever they went, the division's troops organized army-civilian get-together activities, to publicize the truth about the Northern Expedition. As a result, wherever they went they had great prestige, and enjoyed the help and support of locals. In Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces they were called a model division.

This revolutionary ethos had a great impact on Chen Cheng. For the first time he realized how powerful a spiritually vigorous army could be. So in whatever he did subsequently, he set an example with his own conduct. He forbade gambling and smoking for instance: After he himself stopped, his aides Guo Chan and Zhou Zhirou dared not smoke in his presence. He insisted on observing the dress code: Even at the scorching height of summer, he would get up and bind his puttees on right away, and there they would stay until he went to bed at night; the habit followed him from regiment commander to commander-in-chief. While marching under the burning summer sun, he never wore a wide-rimmed bamboo hat popular among the people at the time. During the Fifth Encirclement Campaign against the Jiangxi Soviet, he walked on foot in straw sandals, rather than rode on horseback through the mountains, just like his soldiers did. The troops under his command were fast and flexible, capable of 50 kilometers a day. Of Chiang's units they were one of the few capable of forced march pursuit of the roving Red Army.

Of the KMT's military figures, Chiang Kai-shek had a certain spirituality, as did Chen Cheng.

In December 1929, Chen Cheng's 11th Division fought a bitter battle with Liu Xing's Eighth Army under Tang Shengzhi's Front Army at Queshan, Henan Province. The land was knee-deep in snow, and the battle raged for three days and nights. Chen Cheng personally supervised operations at the front, and finally defeated the Eighth Army. Before disarming the entire army, the victor Chen Cheng sent his logistics section chief to deliver a letter and 5,000 yuan in cash to Liu Xing. He wrote in his letter: “I am deeply grieved that we as brothers have to fight against each other. Please get away fast. The day will come when the nation needs you.”

This is where Chen Cheng differed greatly from Chiang Kai-shek.

Liu Xing, who took the money and fled, later emerged as commander-in-chief of the Yangtze River Defense Headquarters at the start of the anti-Japanese war.

Chen gave all he had in fighting for Chiang, yet knowing much of the fighting was “as brothers fighting against each other.” On this point he was soberly minded like a statesman.

Disapproving, deep down, of such mutual killing, Chen Cheng had no interest in capturing the enemy's chief commander alive, a feat normally considered the greatest honor for a battlefield commander.

Then why did he enthusiastically throw himself into the third, fourth and fifth encirclement campaigns against the Jiangxi Soviet, the biggest example of mutual fratricide in contemporary Chinese history? The answer lies not only in the enigma of his personality.

As punishment for defeat in the Fourth Encirclement Campaign, Chen Cheng was demoted to a lower rank and had a serious demerit put on his record. In order to bestir the troops that had “forfeited revolutionary spirit,” “lacked belief” and “were mortally afraid of death,” Chiang Kai-shek set up an officer training corps at Mount Lushan. Chen Cheng threw himself into the rigid training slated for eradicating the Red Army.

The full name of the first three terms of the corps was: “China Kuomintang's officer training corps for the Jiangxi-Guangdong-Fujian-Hunan-Hubei North Route Encirclement Campaign.” Its objective was to train officers at and above platoon level of the North Route - the main force for the Fifth Encirclement Campaign.

Chen Cheng was appointed the corps commander. There were two deputy commanders: Liu Shaoxian who had followed Chen Cheng for years, and Liu Shan, a planner of the blockhouse policy.

While at Mount Lushan, he pored over the Red Army's tactics. He put them into four categories: luring the enemy in for ambush; cutting in the middle; breaking through from the front; and outflanking and attacking in the rear. In his view, these were the tactics that bamboozled the KMT commanders.

In order to cope with these Red Army tactics, Chen Cheng led the drafting of counter-measures: the “one essential, two main points, three slogans, four key elements, and six principles.”

The one essential: “obey orders.”

The two main points: “tactical dispersal and assembling of forces.”

The three slogans: “do not retreat when injured; do not succumb when captured; do not shrink at danger.”

The four key elements: “reliability, pace, silence, secrecy.”

The six principles: “exploration, liaison, reconnaissance, precautions, shelter, observation.”

Chen believed that in-depth study and the skillful use of these measures would enable them to defeat the Red Army.

He paid particular attention to two things in the field exercises: shooting and mountain climbing.

In terms of shooting, Chen developed some calculations all of his own.

One went thus: Assuming that 10 bullets are needed to kill one Red Army man, each KMT soldier can kill 20 if he carries 200 bullets with him. It follows that each regiment, assuming 1,000 rifles apiece, can kill 20,000 Red Army men. Therefore, he reckoned, three regiments were sufficient to wipe out the Red Army troops inside the Central Soviet Area; and to destroy the entire Red Army, he would need 10 regiments at most.

Another calculation went: If one gun can kill one Red Army man in every five minutes, then a gun can kill 12 people in an hour; thus, 3,000 soldiers can kill 216,000 enemies in six hours. So eliminating the Red Army with the use of just 1,000 combat soldiers “would have the job done with no problem.”

All-round battlefield fighting, under Chen's calculation, became single-focus marksmanship practice - and at fixed targets moreover. This battle-tested veteran general suddenly became a poor student counting on his fingers. But one point is clear: His antipathy to “mutual killing,” mentioned when he let Liu Xing escape, did not apply to the encirclement campaign against the Red Army.

Chen's theorizing was much more reliable when it came to mountain training.

From bitter experience in the previous four encirclement campaigns, Chen Cheng summed up four points to cope with the Red Army's mountain guerrilla warfare and mobile warfare:

One, climbing practice. The KMT troops, especially those from northern China, could not climb mountains and were afraid of doing so. It was a fatal weakness of the encirclement troops. So it was essential to train them up in ways of “surmounting peaks and cliffs,” in order to prevent them being “restricted by terrain and roads” but also enabling them to “turn all terrains and roads to best advantage.”

Two, mastering through practice the basic military techniques, as per the “six principles” and “four key elements.”

Three, to counter the Red Army's tactics of “unpredictable attacks, uncertain whereabouts, small units taking on big targets,” as well as “loner” guerrilla tactics, the KMT troops must be able to “scout far afield in civilian clothes, to march at the double with light packs, be covert and alert, and march at night to attack at dawn.”

Four, use artillery to the full. When attacking targets high on a mountain unreachable by infantry and beyond the range of their guns, the use of artillery troops had great advantages.

It was this officer training corps that produced a big change in Chen Cheng's fortunes.

October 1933 saw the official start of the Fifth Encirclement Campaign. Chen Cheng was made commander-in-chief of the Third Route Army and concurrently front commander-in-chief of the North Route Army. The feats recorded under the name of Gu Zhutong, another of Chiang's “Big Eight” and commander-in-chief of the North Route Army, were actually achieved by Chen Cheng.

They were as follows: racing to seize Lichuan, cutting off contact between the Central Soviet Area and the Fujian-Zhejiang-Jiangxi Soviet Area; seriously damaging the Red Army's Third and Seventh corps in the Xuwan Battle; leading the Red Army's First and Ninth corps to suffer great casualties at Daxiongguan; storming into Guangchang, Jianning and Gu Longgang; launching the bloody battles of Gaohunao and Wannianting; and, finally, hemming the Red Army in Shicheng, forcing the central organs of the Red Army to start the Long March prematurely. iGSZv90D73glDAje1sY4O8ZG+Uag9G0gJzeRT9nyehLYxsByb32uVP8nZJVrWjxa