Handan Campaign

Part of Chinese Civil War

Date	October 22, 1945 – November 2, 1945
Location	Handan, Hebei, China
Result	Communist victory

Belligerents

National Revolutionary Army

Chinese Red Army

Commanders and leaders

Ma Fawu

Gao Shuxun

Liu Bocheng

Deng Xiaoping

Strength

45,000 for the 1st echelon
100,000 for the 2nd echelon

60,000 regular
100,000 militia

Casualties and losses

3,000 killed
17,000 captured
10,000 defected

4,708 total

Handan Campaign (邯郸战役), also known as Pinghan Campaign (平汉战役), short for Beiping-Hankou Campaign (北平汉口战役), is one of the largest clashes between the communist force and the nationalist force immediately after the end of World War II, which resulted in communist victory.

During the Shangdang Campaign, communist units of the Shanxi-Hebei-Shandong-Henan (晋冀鲁豫) Military Region succeeded in taking control over a 200 km section of the railway from Beijing to Hankou, and the adjacent regions along this section. Their nationalist enemy were determined to dislodge the communist force from their newly gained territory and planned an offensive that would significantly boost the nationalist bargaining chips in the peace negotiation with the communist opponent.

The nationalist side deployed around 145,000 troops in two echelons, and the first echelon mainly consisted of three armies from the 11th War Zone to strike northward from Xinxiang (新乡) in two fronts: the nationalist left front consisted of the Newly Organized 8th Army and the 30th Army, while the nationalist right front consisted of the 40th Army and the 9th Combat Engineering Regiment.

The second echelon also consisted of two fronts: In the south, the nationalist 32nd Army of the 11th War Zone would follow the 40th Army to Anyang (安阳), and then would continue and linkup with the 3rd Army and the 16th Army of the nationalist 1st War Zone at Shijiazhuang. Once the three armies had joined their forces, they would continue push northward and linkup with the 92nd Army and 94th Army, which would strike southward from Beijing, where these two nationalist armies were previously airlifted to the ancient city.

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Wikipedia