Battle of Siping

Battle of Siping
Part of the Chinese Civil War
PLA troops bombard Nationalist positions with artillery
Date March 15, 1946 - March 17, 1946 Location Siping, Jilin, China Result Decisive Communist victory
Belligerents
National Revolutionary Army	Chinese Red Army
Commanders and leaders
Liu Handong 刘瀚东	Li Tianyou 李天佑 Wan Yi 万毅
Strength
3,000	6,000
Casualties and losses
3,000	235

The Battle of Siping (四平战斗), also called the Battle to Liberate Siping (四平解放战) by the communists was a battle fought between the Communist Forces and the Nationalist Forces in Jilin, China for the control of Siping (city) during the Chinese Civil War. It took place immediately after the Red Army withdrew from Siping in March 1946, and resulted in a communist victory.

On January 8, 1946, Liu Handong (刘瀚东), the commander of the nationalist 107th Division arrived at Siping (city) with over a hundred associates to discuss the city's transfer from the Red Army to the Chinese administration. The Red Army still occupied the city at the time. Subsequently, on January 10, the nationalists created the Liaobei (辽北) Province, with Liu Handong (刘瀚东) named the chairman of the province, and nationalist provincial governmental member Li Chongguo (李充国) named the mayor of Siping (city).

The Nationalists had neither sufficient troops nor enough transportation assets to deploy its troops into the previously Japanese-occupied region of China, and they could not spare enough forces to hold the city long enough for reinforcements to arrive. The Nationalists at Siping recruited bandits in the region including members from the Good Under the Heaven (天下好) and Flying Over the Grass (草上飞) gangs to secure the local garrison.

Enlisting the gangs angered the local populace, which already blamed the Nationalists for losing the region to the Japanese invaders. As a result, the Nationalists lost popular support in the region, a problem exacerbated by the fact that the hired bandits had fought the Nationalists both prior to and during the war and had cooperated with the Japanese invaders. The Nationalists recruited forces from the former Japanese puppet regime, such as the Iron Stone Units (Tie Shi Bu Dui, 铁石部队), to be part of the local garrison, which only increased the hatred from the local populace, which had suffered under the Japanese puppet regime.

...
Wikipedia