5. STARTING THE COUNTER-OFFENSIVE
The problem of starting a counter-offensive is the problem of the
"initial battle" or "prelude".
Many bourgeois military experts advise caution in the initial
battle, whether one is on the strategic defensive or on the
strategic offensive, but more especially when on the defensive. In the past we,
too, have stressed this as a serious point. Our operations against the five
enemy campaigns of "encirclement and suppression" in Kiangsi Province
have given us rich experience, a study of which will not be without benefit.
In his first campaign, the enemy employed about 100,000 men,
divided Into eight columns, to advance southward from the Kian-Chienning line
against the Red Army's base area. The Red Army had about 40,000 men and was
concentrated in the area of Huangpi and Hsiaopu in Ningtu County, Kiangsi
Province.
The situation was as follows:
(1) The "suppression" forces did not exceed 100,000 men,
none of whom were Chiang Kai-shek's own troops, and the general situation was
not very grave.
(2) The enemy division under Lo Lin, defending Kian, was located
across the Kan River to the west.
(3) The three enemy divisions under Kung Ping-fan, Chang Hui-tsan
and Tan Tao-yuan had advanced and occupied the Futien-Tungku-Lungkang-Yuantou
sector southeast of Kian and northwest of Ningtu. The main body of Chang
Hui-tsan's division was at Lungkang and that of Tan Tao-yuan's division at
Yuantou. It was not advisable to select Futien and Tungku as the battleground,
as the inhabitants, misled by the A-B Group, were for a time mistrustful of and
opposed to the Red Army.
(4) The enemy division under Liu Ho-ting was far away in Chienning
in the White area of Fukien, and was unlikely to cross into Kiangsi.
(5) The two enemy divisions under Mao Ping-wen and Hsu Keh-hsiang
had entered the Toupi-Lokou-Tungshao sector lying between Kuangchang and
Ningtu. Toupi was a White area, Lokou a guerrilla zone, and
Tungshao, where there were A-B Group elements, was a place from which
information was liable to leak out. Furthermore, if we were to attack Mao
Ping-wen and Hsu Keh-hsiang and then drive westward, the three enemy divisions
m the west under Chang Hui-tsan, Tan Tao-yuan and Kung Ping-fan might join
forces, thus making it difficult for us to win victory and impossible to bring
the issue to a final solution.
