Wang Yaou ( wh. Ex . 王耀武 , 1904–1968) was a high-ranking Kuomintang general and governor of Shandong Province , who successfully fought with the Japanese imperial army and the Chinese Communists. In September 1948, during the Jingyang battle, he was captured by the communist army. He was in captivity until 1959, when he was pardoned. During the Cultural Revolution, he was persecuted by the Red Guards as a former commander of the nationalist army and died of a heart attack in 1968.
| Wang Yaou | |
|---|---|
 General Wang Yaou | |
| Date of Birth | |
| Place of Birth | |
| Date of death | |
| Place of death | |
| Years of service | 1924-1948 |
| Rank | General |
| Commanded | 74th Corps, 4th Army |
| Awards and prizes | Order of Blue Sky and White Sun |
Content
Early life and career
Wang was born into a peasant family in Shandong Province. In early childhood he lost his father and older brother, and his mother raised him alone. When Sun Yat-sen opened the Military Academy at Wampoa, Wang Yaou worked as a security guard at the store. Immediately borrowing money from his employer, he went south to join the national revolution. His fellow students are Du Yumin, Fan Hanjie, Hu Lian, Liu Yujian, Guan Lincheng, and Lin Biao. After graduating from the academy he joined the Northern Expedition of Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek against the northern militarists. After Chang purged the communists in Shanghai on April 12, 1927, he remained with the Kuomintang as regiment commander in the National Revolutionary Army. In 1930 he participated in the war of the Central Plain with the rank of colonel. In 1932, after successfully defending their position against attacks by enemy troops during the fourth campaign against communist Jiangxi, Chiang Kai-shek was adopted. Appointed commander of the brigade, and then the commander of the 51st division . Two years later, Wang took part in the Fifth Campaign against Jiangxi. In September 1934, he captured the Chinese Communist leader Fang Zhiming, who commanded the Red Army. In 1935, he won another victory in Jiangxi province, seizing the entire corps of officers of the 10th corps of the Red Army and was promoted to major general.
Second Sino-Japanese War
In 1937, Wang commanded a division in the battle of Shanghai. The commander of one of his regiments was Zhang Lingfu, who had just been released from prison on bail. At the end of November, the Chinese army lost the battle in Shanghai and the Japanese army under the command of General Ivane Matsui approached Nanking . During the battle for Nanjing, the 51st Wang's division suffered heavy losses. His chief, General Tang Shengzhi, fled the city without notifying Yaou and other high-ranking commanders. Van barely managed to leave the city. 3000 warriors under his command managed to break through from the Japanese environment.
In 1938, he took part in the battle for Lanfeng against the 14th division of the Japanese imperial army under the command of General Kenji Doihara, one of the instigators of the Manchurian incident . The inability to keep the Japanese offensive led to the decision of the nationalist government to open the dam on the Yellow River. During the battle for Wanlin, the units commanded by Wang reflected the attempts of the Japanese to escape from the Chinese environment. During the battles, the 106th Division of the Japanese Imperial Army, Lieutenant General Dzyunrokuro Matsuura, was almost completely destroyed. In 1939, Wang led his unit to participate in the battle for Nanchang, but Chinese troops could not hold the city. Wang, however, distinguished himself in the battle of Changsha (1939) and was appointed commander of the 74th corps. Under his command, the 74th Corps became one of the elite units of the Chinese government army and fought in almost every battle in the remaining period of the war. By the end of the war, General Wang was appointed commander of the 4th Army and became a member of the central Kuomintang committee.
Chinese Civil War
When civil war broke out again in China in 1946, General Wang was appointed Governor of Shandong Province and Commander-in-Chief of the province. With great difficulty, he established his power because of the rivalry of various nationalist commanders. In May 1947, his rule was dealt a serious blow: the commander of the 74th corps, his old subordinate, Lieutenant-General Zhang Lingfu, died at a critical moment in the campaign and most of the nationalist troops stationed in his province were redeployed to other places. In 1948, Chinese communist forces under the command of Chen Yi and Su Yu, attacked the provincial capital during the battle for Jinan. Under General Wan, only the local garrison forces, consisting of recruits, were under command. The fate of Jinan was decided when one of its corps commanders (Wu Huaven) went over to the side of the Chinese communist forces. The enemy troops broke through the defense of the city, General Van fled from his headquarters and was captured in the neighboring district.
Recent years and death
During his imprisonment, Wang called on his colleagues in the nationalist command to surrender to the PLA, which caused a storm of disputes, as President Chiang Kai-shek always supported him. As a result of his collaboration with the communist forces, Yaou was one of the first commanders of the nationalist army, released in 1959. Later he worked in the Chinese political consultative conference and other government organizations. When the Cultural Revolution began, Wang Yaou was persecuted by the Red Guards. He died of a heart attack in 1968 as a result of ill-treatment.
He was posthumously rehabilitated by the Deng Xiaoping government in 1980. Reburied with state honors. The urn with its ashes rests in the Babaoshan cemetery in the Revolutionary Mourning Hall, as the remains of one of the most important revolutionary heroes of China.