page_title: Lin Biao
section_title: Liaoshen Campaign
hierarchical_section_title: Lin Biao / Revolutionary / Liaoshen Campaign
caption_attribution_description: Dongbei Ju leaders having a military conference in Harbin.东北局领导在哈尔滨召开军事会议。左起：林彪、高岗、陈云、张闻天、吕正操。
context_page_description: Lin Biao was a Marshal of the People's Republic of China who was pivotal in the Communist victory in the Chinese Civil War, especially in Northeast China. Lin was the general who commanded the decisive Liaoshen and Pingjin Campaigns, in which he co-led the Manchurian Field Army to victory and led the People's Liberation Army into Beijing. He crossed the Yangtze River in 1949, decisively defeated the Kuomintang and took control of the coastal provinces in Southeast China. He ranked third among the Ten Marshals. Zhu De and Peng Dehuai were considered senior to Lin, and Lin ranked directly ahead of He Long and Liu Bocheng.
  Lin abstained from taking an active role in politics after the civil war ceased in 1949. He led a section of the government's civil bureaucracy as one of the co-serving Vice Premiers of the People's Republic of China from 1954 onwards, becoming First Vice Premier from 1964. Lin became more active in politics when named one of the co-serving Vice Chairmen of the Communist Party of China in 1958. He held the three responsibilities of Vice Premier, Vice Chairman and Minister of National Defense from 1959 onwards.
context_section_description: Lin was absent for most of the fighting during World War II, but was elected the sixth-ranking Central Committee member in 1945 based on his earlier battlefield reputation. After the Japanese surrender, the Communists moved large numbers of troops to Manchuria (Northeast China), and Lin Biao relocated to Manchuria to command the new "Communist Northeast Military District". The Soviets transferred captured Japanese military equipment to the Communists, making Lin's army one of the most well-equipped Communist forces in China. By the time that units from the Kuomintang (Nationalists) were able to arrive in the major cities of Manchuria, Lin's forces were already in firm control of most of the countryside and surrounding areas.
  By the end of 1945, Lin had 280,000 troops in Manchuria under his command, but according to Kuomintang estimates only 100,000 of these were regular forces with access to adequate equipment. The KMT also estimated that Lin also had access to 100,000 irregular auxiliaries, whose membership was drawn mainly from unemployed factory workers. Lin avoided decisive confrontations throughout 1945, and he was able to preserve the strength of his army despite criticism from his peers in the Party and the PLA.
  For the sake of bargaining with the Kuomintang in peace negotiations in 1946, Mao ordered Lin to assemble his army to take and defend key cities, which was against the previous strategy of the Red Army. Lin disagreed with this position, but was ordered by Mao to draw the KMT into a decisive battle and "not give an inch of land" around Siping, Jilin. On April 15, Lin orchestrated an ambush and forced KMT forces there to withdraw with heavy casualties. When the local KMT commander, Du Yuming, launched a counterattack on April 18, Mao ordered the troops there to hold the city indefinitely. The fighting continued until Mao finally allowed Lin to withdraw on May 19, which Lin did immediately, barely saving his army from encirclement and destruction.
  Du pursued Lin's forces to the south bank of the Songhua River, where they halted due to Du's concerns about his army becoming overextended. According to Communist sources, Lin's army lost 15,000 soldiers in the fighting and withdrawal, but Nationalist sources claim that 25,000 soldiers also deserted or surrendered, and that Lin's force of 100,000 irregular auxiliaries suffered from mass desertion during the retreat. On June 10, the two forces agreed to a ceasefire brokered by George Marshall, and fighting temporarily ceased. Mao ordered Lin to counterattack that winter, but Lin refused, replying that his forces were exhausted and not logistically prepared to do so.
  When Du led the majority of his forces to attack Communist forces on the Korean border in January 1947, Lin finally ordered 20,000 of his soldiers to cross the Songhua River, where they staged guerrilla raids, ambushed relief forces, attacked isolated garrisons, and avoided decisive confrontations with strong units Du sent to defeat them. While they did so, they looted large quantities of supplies and destroyed the infrastructure of the KMT-held territories that they passed through, including bridges, railroads, fortifications, electrical lines, and boats. When Du sent his forces back south, they were ambushed and defeated. When Du requested reinforcements from Chiang Kai-shek, his request was rejected.
  On April 8, Lin moved his headquarters from Harbin to Shuangcheng in order to be closer to the front. On May 5, he held a conference with his subordinates and announced that his armies would change tactics, engage in a large-scale counterattack, and seek to defeat Du's forces in a decisive battle. On May 8, Lin launched the first of his "three great campaigns", the Summer Offensive, intending to engage a large garrison at Huaide while a second force positioned itself to ambush the force that would predictably be sent to relieve it. On May 17, they won a major victory and forced the survivors to retreat to Changchun and Siping. By the end of May 1947, Lin's forces had taken control of most of the countrysi
caption: Lin with high-ranking officers under his command (Harbin, 1946)
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