Peng.D.H

## Skills

Infantry Leader (Lvl 1)

Camouflage (Lvl 3)

Entrenchment (Lvl 1)

Free Slot

**Peng.D.H** is a Chinese Communist General that can be bought for 1565 Medals.

## **History**

**Peng Dehuai** (Simplified:彭德怀) was a prominent Chinese Communist military leader, who served as China's Defense Minister. Peng was born into a poor peasant family, and received several years of primary education before his family's poverty forced him to suspend his education at the age of ten, and to work for several years as a manual laborer. When he was sixteen, Peng became a professional soldier. In 1926 Peng's forces joined the Kuomintang, and Peng was first introduced to communism. Peng supported Wang Jingwei's attempt to form a left-leaning Kuomintang government based in Wuhan. After Wang was defeated, Peng briefly rejoined Chiang Kai-shek's forces before joining the Chinese Communist Party.

Peng was one of the most senior generals who defended the Jiangxi Soviet from Chiang's attempts to capture it, and his successes were rivaled only by Lin Biao. During the 1937–1945 Second Sino-Japanese War, Peng was one of the strongest supporters of pursuing a ceasefire with the Kuomintang in order to concentrate China's collective resources on resisting the Japanese Empire. Peng was the senior commander in the combined Kuomintang-Communist efforts to resist the Japanese occupation. In 1940, Peng conducted the Hundred Regiments Offensive, a massive Communist effort to disrupt Japanese logistical networks across northern China. The Hundred Regiments Offensive was modestly successful, but political disputes within the Communist Party led to Peng being recalled to Yan'an, and he spent the rest of the war without an active command. In 1945, Peng was given command of Communist forces in Manchuria. He was the most senior commander responsible for defending the Communist leadership in Shaanxi from Kuomintang forces and eventually defeated the Kuomintang in Northwest China, captured huge amounts of military supplies, and actively incorporated the huge area, including Xinjiang, into the People's Republic of China.

Peng was one of the military leaders who supported Mao's suggestions to involve China directly in the Korean War, and he served as the direct commander of the Chinese People's Volunteer Army for the first half of the war. Peng's experiences in the Korean War convinced him that the Chinese military had to become more professional, organized, and well-equipped in order to prepare itself for the conditions of modern technical warfare. Because the Soviet Union was the only communist country then equipped with a fully modern, professional army, Peng attempted to reform China's military on the Soviet model over the next several years, making the army less political and more professional. Peng resisted Mao's attempts to develop a personality cult; and, when Mao's economic policies associated with the Great Leap Forward caused a nationwide famine, Peng became critical of Mao's leadership. The rivalry between Peng and Mao was eventually won by Mao and labeled Peng as a leader of an "anti-Party clique", and purged Peng from all his positions for the rest of his life.