In the East China Field Army, Ye Fei, Tao Yong, and Wang Bicheng were called "Ye Wang Tao". People who don't know think it's a person's name, but it's actually the three great generals of Huaye.
After the founding of the People's Republic of China, among them, Ye Fei was rated as a regular corps and awarded a general; Tao Yong and Wang Bicheng were respectively rated as deputy corps and awarded to lieutenant generals. Regarding Wang Bicheng's "troublesome military rank", is this really the case?
Ye Fei, Tao Yong, and Wang Bicheng fought directly under the direct leadership of Su Yu during the Anti-Japanese War, and even more so during the War of Liberation.
In January 1947, after the merger of the Shandong Mountain Field Army and the Central China Field Army, Ye Fei continued to serve as the commander of the 1st Column, Tao Yong served as the commander of the 4th Column, and Wang Bicheng served as the commander of the 6th Column.
In the more than a year from the end of the Anti-Japanese War to the establishment of Huaye, Ye Fei commanded the column to be subordinate to the Shandong Field Army, while Tao Yong and Wang Bicheng belonged to the Central China Field Army. Originally, Ye Fei's column was going north to fight in the northeast, but after arriving in Shandong, he stayed in Shandong because of the change in the situation and was incorporated into the Shandong Field Army.
Compared with fighting in Central China, Ye Fei's column did not fight well in Shandong, the first troops were all southerners, and their eating habits were different, although Mr. Chen had always been his old leader, in fact, he fought more under the direct leadership of Su Yu, and the southern troops fought with the Shandong troops because of their different living habits, and there was disunity.
However, after learning that the people of Shandong gave the best grain to the column, everyone also had a considerable change in their thinking, and they also increased their understanding, and moved from disunity to unity. In terms of operations, there are many wars of attrition and rout, but few wars of annihilation, and there are casualties that cannot be replenished in a timely manner. Therefore, after the establishment of Huaye, the Piding Junbu that broke out of the Central Plains has always been assigned to the 1st column operation.
Speaking of Wang Bicheng's war in Central China, he was very tough, especially after the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, he fought with the elite of the Kuomintang army many times, and participated in the Huaiyin Defense Battle and Lianshui Defense Battle. Due to the many hard battles fought, the troops suffered a lot of losses, and many captive soldiers were replenished in the later wars. Like in the Battle of Laiwu, there is an obvious record, 6 columns captured the most enemies,
The captives became liberation fighters, and although they had combat experience, they had poor discipline and did not pay much attention to tactics when they were red-eyed. For this reason, Chief Chen Su transferred Guo Huaruo, deputy commander of the Lunan Military Region, to the post of deputy commander, and made more efforts in discipline and tactical training. At that time, the column already had a deputy commander, and he was Pi Dingjun. The arrangement of two deputy commanders in one column was also a rare phenomenon among all columns at that time.
Although the discipline is a little poor, this is not because the commanders are incompetent, and a third of a unit, or even more liberation fighters, will take time to transform and retrain even which unit they are placed in. The responsibility cannot be blamed on Wang Bicheng, military cadres are responsible for fighting wars, and political commissars are responsible for political discipline work. At that time, the political commissar was Jiang Weiqing, who had not been in the army for a long time, and his superiors transferred Guo Huaruo to be more responsible for military and political work.
The 6th Column played a great role in the Menglianggu Campaign, the Eastern Henan Campaign, and the Huaihai Campaign.
In 1949, after the reorganization of the troops, he was promoted to deputy commander of the corps. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, he entered the Military Academy twice and served as deputy commander and acting commander of the Volunteer Corps. In 1955, he succeeded Guo Huaruo as the commander of the higher-level garrison area. In 1960, he was transferred to the Nanjing Military Region as deputy commander, and once again succeeded Guo Huaruo in charge of military training.
In 1952, he was promoted to the rank of deputy corps, and according to his seniority and achievements, he was in no way inferior to other generals. In 1955, he was awarded the rank of lieutenant general, and some people said that he made trouble with the military rank, and even asked the old chief Tan Zhenlin and others. We don't know the truth of the matter, but one thing is that Wang Bicheng is a general who speaks little.
Anyone who has been in contact with him knows this. He has comrades-in-arms in his heart, but he is not enthusiastic on the surface. Ye Fei once said one thing, he invited Su Yu, Ye Fei, and Tao Yong to take a group photo, and washed out the photos and framed them for everyone. The most important point is that Ye Fei said that he was not proud of his achievements, and the war was not ideal, but he was a little depressed, such as the battle of Lianshui Defense.
It is impossible for such a general, who can fight habitually, to have anything to do with the "troubled military rank".
The evaluation of military ranks not only considers qualifications, positions, military merits, and morality, but also "mountains". Tracing back to the source, Wang Bicheng and Tao Yong were both generals from the Red Fourth Front Army. Taking into account the balance of the "hill", the number of generals is limited. Ten generals of the Red Fourth Front Army were awarded generals, such as Xu Shiyou, Wang Hongkun, Chen Zaidao, Wang Jian'an, Hong Xuezhi, Xie Fuzhi, Wang Xinting, Fu Zhong, Zhou Quanchun, and Chen Xilian.
Among the 10 of them, only Chen Xilian served as a division during the Red Army, and the others were all military ranks, such as director of the military political department and army commander. The reason why Chen Xilian was awarded the rank of general is that he served as the commander of the corps in Erye, and his achievements were remarkable, and the conditions in all aspects were also up to standard.
If Wang Bicheng meets the standards of a general, Tao Yong is not bad, and the achievements of Erye Wang Jinshan are even more prominent, they are all from the Red Fourth Front Army. I have to say that there are too many generals in the Four Front Army, and if military ranks are only awarded according to their positions and military merits, I believe that the generals are all generals of the Red 1st Front Army and the Red Fourth Front Army.
After the founding of the People's Republic of China, his position was also outstanding, in 1971 he served as the commander of the Kunming Military Region, in 1979 as the commander of the Wuhan Military Region, and then retired as vice president of the Academy of Military Sciences due to his health, until his retirement in the 80s.