On December 12, 1936, Zhang Xueliang and Yang Hucheng suddenly carried out military advice in Xi'an, Shaanxi Province, and Chiang Kai-shek was arrested, and the Kuomintang Nanjing government in Nanjing was immediately in chaos. Song Meiling, Song Ziwen, and others were anxious to rescue Chiang Kai-shek, He Yingqin and others were in the main battle, and the Kuomintang troops outside Xi'an, Shaanxi Province, suppressed the border and clashed with the Northeast Army and the Northwest Army.
The Kuomintang Central Commander Xu Enzeng was not idle, and he wanted to express his loyalty to the "leader" at this time, and agents of all sizes met urgently on how to rescue Chiang Kai-shek trapped in Xi'an.
One by one, the Kuomintang agents racked their brains, there were many people who came up with ideas, and the rescue plans were also varied, looking lively and lively, as if one was more loyal and resourceful than the other, but in Xu Enzeng's view, there was no real one, but the "airborne rescue" plan proposed by secret agent Li Maotang made him quite interested.
Li Maotang listed the various feasible bases for the "airborne rescue" plan, and finally volunteered to ask Xu Enzeng: "I am willing to go to Xi'an to carry out this task!" ”
Xu En was quite moved: "This move is loyal and commendable, look, which other comrade is willing to go to Xi'an with you?" ”
The venue, which was still lively and lively, suddenly fell silent, and the agents looked at him with wide eyes and small eyes, and no one took his words.
Li Maotang saw Xu Enzeng with an embarrassed face and said busily: "I can go alone, I am from Shaanxi, I am very familiar with the terrain of Xi'an, and there are many relatives and friends in Xi'an, there will always be a way." I just want to ask the bureau to give me permission to let the comrades in Xi'an cooperate with my actions. ”
Xu En had said busily: "No problem, I will arrange it immediately." ”
Li Maotang said that he would do it, and that night, he really boarded a plane that Xu En had transferred and flew to Xi'an in the eyes of everyone.
The plane lowered its flight altitude in the airspace on the outskirts of Xi'an, and Li Maotang jumped off the plane and landed safely.
At that time, Xi'an City was already under martial law, the soldiers were in chaos, and martial law was imposed day and night, so Li Maotang had to hide in the homes of relatives first.
Early the next morning, Li Maotang was about to enter the city disguised as Mr. Accounting Room, but found that the city gate was like a great enemy, and presumably the plane that flew to Xi'an yesterday had already alarmed the Northeast Army. Li Maotang tried to sneak into the city, but unexpectedly, at the gate of Xi'an City, he was seen by the vigilant soldiers of the Northeast Army, and he was kidnapped and detained on the spot.
Li Maotang's identity as a Kuomintang central unification agent was quickly identified, and a Kuomintang central unification agent wanted to break into Xi'an City during this sensitive period, which was naturally particularly eye-catching, but even though the intelligence department of the Northeast Army tortured Li Maotang, he still pretended to be deaf and dumb, clenched his teeth, and did not know what to ask.
The generals of the Northeast Army originally hated the secret agents of the Central Command and the Military Command to the bone, and seeing that Li Maotang was so stubborn, he hated it even more, and reported it to the young marshal, and Zhang Xueliang, who was "under great pressure" after arresting Jiang, ordered in anger: "Drag it out and kill him!" ”
It was also Li Maotang's fate that coincided with this, and at this time, the CPC deputies who had been invited by Zhang Xueliang to Xi'an heard the news and promptly advised the young marshal to act cautiously, and Li Maotang was lucky enough to avoid death.
Do you dare to believe that li Maotang, a "loyal and courageous man" who dared to parachute into Xi'an and rescue Chiang Kai-shek and a special agent of the Kuomintang Central Unification, was actually an underground member of the CPC.
Li Maotang, a native of Weinan, Shaanxi Province, went to xi'an Telegraph Transmission Institute in 1921 to study, and after graduation worked as a telegraph clerk in the Shaanxi Provincial Telegraph Bureau, and was a veteran party member who joined the Communist Party of China in 1926.
Beginning in 1935, Li Maotang's legendary and tortuous lurking career began a new phase. In that year, Li Maotang was arrested by the Kuomintang in Zhengzhou, Henan Province, and the Kuomintang Central Committee promised Li Maotang a high-ranking official Houlu to induce him to surrender.
The leader of the Central Special Branch especially told him that he had been lurking in the Kuomintang for a long time, not to take it lightly, and that the more active and realistic he behaved in the face of the enemy, the better. Therefore, in this "airborne rescue" operation in Xi'an, Shaanxi Province, Li Maotang's performance was far more positive than that of other agents, so it is beyond reproach that he became a heroic figure who "touched" Chiang Kai-shek.
Li Maotang ventured to Xi'an alone, parachuted to rescue Chiang Kai-shek, although unsuccessful, when he escaped from Shaanxi and returned to Nanjing, Li Maotang was still greeted heroically, Chiang Kai-shek praised him for his "loyalty to the party-state and praiseworthy", Xu Enzeng also followed the light on his face, and from then on he treated him differently, and Li Maotang stood out.
After the outbreak of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, another action by Li Maotang attracted Chiang Kai-shek's attention even more, and a top Japanese killer was under Li Maotang's men, who had successfully assassinated Kim Kuo, chairman of the South Korean Independence Party.
With a stroke of His pen, Li Maotang was immediately promoted two levels in a row, and he was immediately appointed as the chief instructor of the Kuomintang Central Unification Special Training Class and deputy director of the Shaanxi Investigation Office of the Central Unification, and became Xu Enzeng's right-hand man and the leading figure of the Central Unification in Shaanxi.
As Chiang Kai-shek's favorite courtier, Hu Zongnan, the "King of the Northwest", naturally pulled Li Maotang to his left and right, and Li Maotang also pushed the boat along the water, and it did not take long to become one of Hu Zongnan's trusted confidants.
The "sad" Hu Zongnan already had a Xiong Xianghui by his side, and with Li Maotang, his Kuomintang stronghold in Xi'an had simply become the world of the Communist Party. Although Li Maotang and Xiong Xianghui did not communicate with each other and did not know each other's true identities, they were in a god-like synchronization, and "played with the "Northwest King" Hu Zongnan between the palms of their hands.
In the course of Hu Zongnan's operation to secretly mobilize soldiers and horses to prepare for a blitzkrieg against Yan'an in accordance with Chiang Kai-shek's instructions, Hu Zongnan presided over a top-secret military conference, and among the people attending this small-scale meeting were Hu Zongnan's confidential secretaries Xiong Xianghui and Li Maotang.
Hu Zongnan hurriedly sent someone to send Li Maotang to the hospital for rescue, and as soon as he left the gate of the official residence of the director of the Xi'an Appeasement Office, Li Maotang took advantage of the panic of the crowd to quietly stuff a small paper ball that secretly recorded the contents of the meeting to his entourage, and asked him to immediately send it to Li Maotang's wife.
Soon, Hu Zongnan's "blitzkrieg Yan'an" plan had already been sent to Yan'an, and of course, there was an intelligence with exactly the same content that reached Yan'an at about the same time, which was the information sent by Xiong Xianghui's line.
Later, Xiong Xianghui's identity was exposed, but the radio waves connecting Xi'an and Yan'an were not interrupted for a moment, let alone disappeared, and li Maotang's line was seamlessly connected, and Hu Zongnan's many detailed operational plans and clearance plans were continuously transmitted to Yan'an through Li Maotang's line.
Not only that, but Li Maotang, relying on his public identity and privileges, did not take much effort to sort out the secret agents of the military command and the central command who had infiltrated Yan'an, and the security personnel in Yan'an dug out the agents on the list one by one according to the list of hidden agents provided by Li Maotang.
He also simply passed on the Telegram code of the Kuomintang Central Unification to Yan'an, so that there were no secrets to speak of in the "King of the Northwest", but the "poor" Hu Zongnan was still in the dark, and he would not and could not believe that Xiong Xianghui would be a member of the Ccp, nor would he suspect that Li Maotang, a "loyal and courageous man" who had parachuted into Xi'an to rescue Chiang Kai-shek, always regarded the two as the most reliable knowers.
In 1949, when the Soldiers of the People's Liberation Army approached the city and the liberation of Xi'an was imminent, he learned that the "King of the Northwest" Hu Zongnan planned to withdraw to Zhongnan Mountain to resist stubbornly, Li Maotang felt a tight heart, Zhongnan Mountain is not far from Xi'an City, Hu Zongnan If Chen Bing is in Zhongnan Mountain, it will be very unfavorable to the liberation of Xi'an.
Li Maotang had a plan, he found Hu Zongnan, a serious persuasion of Hu Zongnan: "I suggest that the general should not retreat to Zhongnan Mountain, the name of Zhongnan Mountain is too unlucky, Zhongnan ... Zongnan..."
Hu Zongnan, the "King of the Northwest", was also mentally confused at this time, and absolutely could not accept such an ominous omen, and finally changed his plans and decided to retreat to southern Shaanxi and Sichuan. His final decision was right in the arms of Li Maotang, zhongnan mountain was indeed too close to Xi'an City, And hu Zongnan's army withdrew like this, and the biggest threat to the liberation of Xi'an was suddenly lifted.
At this time, Li Maotang took the initiative to ask Hu Zongnan to stay in Xi'an temporarily, coordinate the evacuation of personnel, and supervise the implementation of the "Jade Ju Burning" plan, the main content of which was very brutal: After the Kuomintang troops withdrew from Xi'an, they immediately took action to destroy all important targets in Xi'an, including power plants, water plants, important factories and facilities.
In such a critical situation, Li Maotang still did not lose his "loyalty and courage", and Hu Zongnan, the "king of the northwest", was greatly moved, and he agreed to it, and deliberately left a large number of people, money, materials, and an airplane to authorize Li Maotang to dispatch and command with full authority.
On the eve of the liberation of Xi'an, Li Maotang resolutely decided to carry out a counter-offensive action, and his first and most important target of rebellion was the notorious "military unification," for the simple reason that the Xi'an Station of the Kuomintang Military Command in Shaanxi had a list of military commanders lurking in hand, and once these secret agents successfully infiltrated, they would pose a great threat to Xi'an and even the entire Shaanxi Province.
Because he had already made preparations, Li Maotang did not make much effort to get the list of lurkers from Ren Hongyou, head of the Shaanxi Station of the Military Command, and seeing this list of lurkers, Li Maotang couldn't help but be shocked: The Kuomintang military unification planned to leave a huge number of hidden agents in Xi'an and other parts of Shaanxi Province, a total of more than 6,000 people!
In mid-May 1949, Hu Zongnan learned that the People's Liberation Army had occupied the north bank of the Wei River in Shaanxi Province, and a large number of PLA troops were rapidly advancing to Xi'an, so he hurriedly boarded a plane and fled to Hanzhong, Shaanxi, at this time Hu Zongnan had lost confidence in the "great plan of the party and the state", and the only thing worth looking forward to was the earth-shaking explosion from Xi'an City.
However, his "confidant" and loyal CCP member Li Maotang made him despair, and as soon as Hu Zongnan left on his front foot, Li Maotang, with the full cooperation of the underground party in Xi'an, quickly dug up a large amount of explosives buried by Kuomintang agents, thus saving the ancient city of Xi'an from devastating damage.
The People's Liberation Army even entered xi'an City without bloodshed, and Li Maotang immediately began the next step, which was carried out by the People's Liberation Army, and Li Maotang fully cooperated, according to Tu Suoji, and captured all the Kuomintang agents on the lurking list who were planned to lurk in Shaanxi in one fell swoop.
After the founding of the People's Republic of China, Li Maotang served as the first vice minister of the Ministry of Domestic Trade. He died in Beijing in May 1953. In March 1982, after review by the relevant departments of the Communist Party of China, he was rehabilitated and his reputation restored.