11 One day in November 1949, Chiang Kai-shek received a letter from his former subordinate Zhang Zhizhong. Chiang Kai-shek hated Zhang Zhizhong because Zhang Zhizhong was once one of the "Eight King Kongs " under his command. As the chief negotiator of the Kuomintang, he went to to discuss with peace talks, but in the end he stayed in , Peking and "invested to the Communist Party". But after seeing Zhang Zhizhong's letter, Chiang Kai-shek hated Hu Zongnan even more.
Height is less than 1.6 meters tall. Hu Zongnan is the older student among Huangpu students and is nearly thirty years old when he graduates. In the end, with his patience and means, he became the "first person in the emperor's disciple". Among the arrogant classmates in Huangpu , he was the unspoken "first": the first commander, the first commander of the army, the first commander-in-chief of the army, the first and only person who obtained three generals before leaving the mainland, can be called a legend. He can be said to be the direct line among Chiang Kai-shek's direct line and the confidant among his confidants.
Since this is not the case, why did Chiang Kai-shek hate Hu Zongnan? It turned out that Zhang Zhizhong told Chiang Kai-shek a "secret" in the letter that Hu Zongnan's most trusted confidential secretary Xiong Xianghui turned out to be a Communist Party. At this time, Chiang Kai-shek's regime was about to collapse. Chiang Kai-shek originally wanted to resist stubbornly in the southwest, and Hu Zongnan was the greatest force he could rely on the army. But not long ago, Hu Zongnan, together with Song Xilian, requested the troops to be withdrawn to the China-Myanmar border. Chiang Kai-shek, who was suspicious by nature, hated him because Hu Zongnan had hundreds of thousands of well-equipped troops. He did not allow him to participate in the War of Resistance Against Japan, but he was defeated in succession and had to retreat abroad at the last moment. Could it be that he had an ulterior motive with the Communist Party?
What Chiang Kai-shek could not have imagined was that he fell into Premier Zhou's trap without knowing it. If Hu Zongnan really retreated his army to the China-Myanmar border as he wished, the PLA's strategy of encirclement would be difficult to achieve. So, at a banquet for the Kuomintang negotiators not long ago, Premier Zhou specially brought Xiong Xianghui to these former Kuomintang members, and everyone looked at each other without being surprised. What Zhang Zhizhong and others thought about was when Xiong Xianghui revolted, but Premier Zhou told them that Xiong Xianghui did not revolt, but returned to the team. It was after that banquet that Zhang Zhizhong wrote a letter to Chiang Kai-shek.
Xionghui (first from left) is by Hu Zongnan
Under this circumstance, Hu Zongnan repeatedly reported plans to break through Chengdu, but they were rejected by Chiang Kai-shek. With no choice but to do anything, Hu Zongnan had to sit and wait for death. On December 18, the People's Liberation Army was at the city, and Chiang Kai-shek reluctantly approved Hu Zongnan's breakthrough plan to form two major corpses and "fight east and west" and asked Hu Zongnan to personally direct the breakthrough. But in order to save his life, Hu Zongnan had no time to take care of the old man's will. He left his troops and fled from Chengdu by plane, and flew directly to Hainan Island . His troops had no heads and were in chaos and were annihilated one after another.
Chiang Kai-shek was extremely furious when he heard that Hu Zongnan ran away alone. He immediately sent Gu Zhutong to investigate and investigate, which scared Hu Zongnan half to death. He had to fly from Hainan Island to Xichang on December 28 to "make meritorious service" on December 28. At Xichang Airport, the only team that welcomed Hu Zongnan was the scattered team of Zhu Guangzu's troops, the commander of the first division of his direct division, seemed particularly desolate. Chiang Kai-shek ordered Hu Zongnan to contain the escaped troops in western Sichuan and reorganize them, and take charge of Xichang for three months to wait for the changes in the international situation. At this time, Hu Zongnan could control only six or seven thousand troops.
At the end of January 11950, Chiang Kai-shek's three-month order to Hu Zongnan for fixed income to Xichang had expired. Of course, there was no change in the international situation, but the mainland of the country had basically liberation. At this time, Chiang Kai-shek sent Gu Zhutong and Chiang Ching-kuo to Xichang secretly, asking Hu Zongnan to guard the last stronghold on the mainland. Hu Zongnan could not say no, but just made the request to airlift an armed ammunition from a division, but where did Chiang Kai-shek get such a division?
htmlIn late March, the People's Liberation Army divided into two groups, crossed the Jinsha River, and advanced towards Xichang. The leader was his old classmate Chen Geng.Hu Zongnan was restless and wanted to escape, but was afraid that Chiang Kai-shek would blame him. If he didn't leave, he was afraid that he would fall into the hands of the People's Liberation Army. At this time, Chiang Kai-shek's attitude towards Hu Zongnan was, "Severe and die with Xichang, or be captured in battle, let it be natural." Finally, Hu Zongnan's friend Guo Jiqiao came out to plead for him, saying that sending a general to the Communist Party to capture him, the impact was always bad. Chiang Kai-shek accused him of sending a plane to Xichang to pick up Hu Zongnan.
There is a precedent for Chengdu to escape alone. When Hu Zongnan deployed to defend the city in Xichang, his subordinates forced him to ask, "Are you leaving Xichang immediately?" Hu Zongnan was so embarrassed that he had to speak in a skewed manner: "You can concentrate your troops and hold on for two or three days, right?"
In fact, Hu Zongnan's intention was to let his subordinates guard for another four days. Because four days later, on March 28, he had been spending enough time to "hold for three months", and he could still report to Jiang Jiang if he escaped. On March 26, the People's Liberation Army surrounded Xichang. Seeing that the situation was hopeless, Hu Zongnan took more than ten confidants and secretly fled to Taiwan via Haikou, leaving behind the chief of staff and the remaining more than 6,000 officers and soldiers.
On March 27, 1950, on the day Hu Zongnan fled from Xichang to Haikou, the Chiang Kai-shek government explicitly ordered the abolition of " Southwest Military and Political Office " and transferred Hu Zongnan as "Strategic Advisor of the Presidential Office." Chiang Kai-shek did not even allow Hu Zongnan to meet him. At this point, Hu Zongnan had nothing, no soldiers, no territory, and only such a false title with name but no reality. Hu Zongnan was discouraged and exhausted. After finishing his business in Taipei, he went to the Hualien coast in eastern Taiwan to recuperate. It is backed by mountains and seas, and the environment is quiet, which is really a holy place for cultivating the body and mind.
However, not long after the quiet days, an article of impeachment against him appeared in major newspapers in Taiwan and Hong Kong. For a moment, public opinion was in an uproar, and condemnation was overwhelming, and a suppressed momentum attacked Hu Zongnan. It turned out that many people in the Taiwan government refused to let Hu Zongnan go, believing that Hu Zongnan lost the northwest and the southwest, and demanded that Hu Zongnan be held accountable and punish the culprit for the loss of the northwest and southwest.
Immediately afterwards, in early May 1950, Li Mengbiao, a 72-year-old member of the Nashin Nationality from the Taipei Government " Supervision Office ", led the leadership of Li Mengbiao, a member of the Nanxi nationality from the Taipei Government, and joined forces with 46 "Supervision Committee members" to jointly propose the impeachment of Hu Zongnan to the "Supervision Office". The impeachment articles against Hu Zongnan published by newspapers in Hong Kong and Taiwan were published by Li Mengbiao and others, respectively.
At the same time, the Kuomintang government in Taiwan is launching a campaign to "punish dereliction of duty military and political officials." Li Yannian, a classmate of Hu Zongnan's Huangpu First Class and who served as commander-in-chief of the 34th Army in Hu's army, lost Pingtan Island when he was deputy director of the Fuzhou Sui Office. Together with the commander of the 73rd Army, Li Tianxia, was ordered to be seized by Chiang Kai-shek for "retreat without authorization and loss of duty" and handed over to the "Military Court" for trial.
For a moment, Taiwan Island was full of murderous intent and the wind was heard. In this case, after Hu Zongnan read Li Mengbiao's impeachment article, he was so scared that he sweated profusely. He immediately rushed back to Taipei from Hualien to rest and live in Tang Enbo's home on Jinzhou Street.
At this time, some of Hu Zongnan's relatives, friends, old friends, staff and subordinates were also moving around, asking people to find connections to eliminate disasters and solve problems for Hu Zongnan. Someone found Li Mengbiao and other proposers and requested that the original case be cancelled for him. But Li Mengbiao not only did not buy it, but because there were many people coming to plead for mercy, he simply wrote a note and posted it on the wall of the door of his room, saying, "If a distinguished guest comes, if anyone is a lobbyist for Hu Zongnan, please be respectful to avoid being punished."
This road is not open, so I have to find another way.They thought of using public opinion representatives to represent the public opinion representatives, and mobilized some "legislators", led by Jiang Yiping, who is well-known and lawyer-born. They claimed that 108 people including Zhang Honglie, Liu Ji, Xu Shaodi, etc., jointly wrote a letter to Chiang Kai-shek and Chen Cheng, to "defend falsehoods" for Hu Zongnan, listing various difficulties and achievements of Hu Zongnan, and beautified, a defeated general who lost his troops and land, into a loyal, brave, motivated and outstanding meritorious minister, and demanded that the "Executive Yuan" cherish talents and exempt him from his discussion.
Although Chen Cheng competed with Hu Zongnan for favor and had a deep rift during the mainland period, he did not take any action against Hu Zongnan at this time. Instead, after discussing with Chiang Kai-shek, he handed over the impeachment case to the pseudo-Ministry of National Defense for handling. The pseudo-"Ministry of Defense" adopted the strategy of "dragging" and turned big things into small things, and finally came to the conclusion of four words: the matter should be exempted from the negotiation.
Chiang Kai-shek, who fled to Taiwan, was full of thought about how to achieve the "father died and son succeeded" Chiang family dynasty. Anyone that posed a threat to Chiang Ching-kuo would naturally be eradicated. A powerful faction like Hu Zongnan, who had a deep foundation in the army, was of course the first to be affected. Compared with his son, even Huangpu’s confidants are not worth mentioning.
The "punishment of dereliction of duty military and political officials" movement is certainly a means for Chiang Kai-shek to eradicate powerful factions, but in fact the so-called "impeachment case" is just a common means for Chiang Kai-shek to suppress powerful factions. The same experience has happened once in Bai Chongxi and . The final result was almost the same. After a while, Chiang Kai-shek came forward to express his opinion and finally left it alone. The most important thing is that Chiang Kai-shek achieved his goal, whether it was Bai Chongxi or Hu Zongnan, his direct or non-direct lineage, he was eventually deprived of his real power.
After the "impeachment case" was settled, Hu Zongnan lived leisurely at home and lived a life of nothing. The following year, on March 17, 1951, Hu Zongnan suddenly received an order from Chiang Kai-shek to go to the Dachen Island area of the southeastern coast of Zhejiang Province, organize and command the coastal guerrilla troops, form the "Jiangxi Anti-Communist and National Salvation Army", and appoint him as the commander-in-chief of the "National Salvation Army".
The so-called commander-in-chief of the "National Salvation Army", Hu Zongnan commanded only thousands of scattered soldiers and bravely, but Hu Zongnan regarded it as an opportunity to regain favor and took office happily. After reorganizing the troops, Hu Zongnan wanted to try his combat power. After launching multiple attacks on the coastal islands, he succeeded in a sneak attack. At this time, Hu Zongnan played the old trick of occupying Yan'an, reported to Chiang Kai-shek that he had won a great victory, and sent some guns and cannons to Taipei, saying that they were seized, which was a lot of publicity.
However, Chiang Kai-shek's reaction to this obviously disappointed Hu Zongnan. After two years of commanding the straggler You Yong on Dachen Island, he was transferred back to Taiwan and still held some false positions. Hu Zongnan had found Chiang Kai-shek many times and requested to get a specific position, but the order he received was to enter the " National Defense University " for further study. Although he was over fifty years old, he was very unhappy, but he had no choice but to obey the arrangements and pretend to read.
1 In August 1955, Chiang Kai-shek summoned Hu Zongnan several times. Hu Zongnan repeatedly asked for "serving his life", and Chiang Kai-shek gave him the position of Penghu defense commander. Those who know the inside story think that with Hu Zongnan's prestige, they will never take office as the Xiaoxiao defensive commander. Unexpectedly, as soon as Hu Zongnan received the appointment, he happily crossed the west and took office in Penghu.
Soon after, Chiang Kai-shek's pseudo-government chief of staff Peng Mengji went to Penghu to inspect. Hu Zongnan, as the defensive commander, went to the airport to greet him and saluted the "chief". As a younger generation, Peng Mengji repeatedly said that he did not dare to take it, but in fact he was quite proud. Hu Zongnan used to be in the northwest, under one person, and above ten thousand people, showing off his might. Now he has to be respectful to a younger generation. The taste is really hard to describe.
1959, Hu Zongnan's Penghu defense commander's term expired and he was transferred back to Taipei under orders and continued to hold a false position. Every day I just read newspapers, write articles, and spend time.Many people in Taiwan can no longer find out the style of the "Northwest King" from this short and taciturn old man.
During that time, Hu Zongnan often traveled with his wife and children, and looked leisurely and comfortable. But he wrote in his diary every day, "I will accompany my wife to watch a movie this afternoon", "I will accompany my wife to play bridge this afternoon", etc. According to Hu Zongnan's son Hu Weishan , when his father accompanied him to climb a mountain when he was a child, he often screamed alone in the mountains. At that time, Hu Weishan felt that it was too shameful to be with such a father, and only after he grew up understood that this was because his father had been suppressed for too long and too deep.
After Hu Zongnan fled to Taiwan, although he had many old friends, his family was very cold. There was no one except his wife and children, and no one went to Taiwan, including parents, brothers and relatives. Hu Zongnan has been in a high position for many years. Needless to say, he is concerned about his family, he is even reluctant to see him.
961, Hu Zongnan was 65 years old. His years of military life have always been in good health and he rarely gets sick. However, in July of this year, he gradually felt unwell, often coughed, and was always tired and weak. At first he disagreed and studied and governed affairs like in the past. Later, the illness worsened, so Dr. Ding Nong from Taiwan's "Army General Hospital" was invited to treat it.
After examination, it was found that Hu Zongnan had excessive blood fat and abnormal conditions such as blood sugar overflow. This is a symptom of hypertension and diabetes . The doctor asked Hu Zongnan to pay attention to dieting, especially avoid sugar and meat. Hu Zongnan has always been trying hard and self-reliant in life, and never pays attention to food. When he heard the doctor say this, he never eats sugar or meat since then, and only uses vegetables and fruits to fill his stomach every day. A few months later, Hu Zongnan lost a lot of weight, but he was still in good spirits.
Until one day in November 1961, Hu Zongnan went to attend the "Strategic Advisory Committee" meeting held on the fourth floor of Jieshou Pavilion in Taipei. As soon as he reached the second floor, he suddenly felt exhausted and could no longer go up, so he asked someone to ask for leave and return home. Hu Zongnan has always been very strong-willed, and he never mentioned this when he was at home, so no one at home knew about it.
February 4, 1962 is the New Year's Eve. Hu Zongnan was in great spirits. Like in previous years, he had the New Year's Eve dinner with a few old friends, played bridge for two hours, and had a great time. After the guest left, the four children surrounded the father and asked for the New Year's money . In previous years, he only gave each person NT$1 NT$1. This time, Hu Zongnan was extremely happy and personally put four five-yuan red bills in each red envelope. When the children got the New Year's money, they opened it and were very happy. The two young people jumped up and shouted, "Dad is so good, long live Dad!"
On the first day of the Lunar New Year, Hu Zongnan went out early in the morning to greet old friends. That night, Hu Zongnan's condition worsened sharply and he was admitted to Taipei's "Vengining General Hospital" on the third day of the Chinese New Year. When Chiang Ching-kuo went to the hospital to visit, Chiang Ching-kuo said half-jokingly and half-seriously: "The proverb in our hometown of eastern Zhejiang says that death is a 'bold', and I'm afraid I'm going to be a bride this time!" Chiang Ching-kuo comforted a few words and stood up and left. Before leaving, he told Hu Zongnan that Chiang Kai-shek would come to visit him in person on Sunday, and Hu Zongnan was flattered.
Early on Sunday, Hu Zongnan, despite his serious illness and weakness, got up early in the morning, got a haircut and shave. At around 10 o'clock in the morning, Chiang Kai-shek walked into the ward with his attendant medical officer. When Hu Zongnan saw Chiang Kai-shek, he struggled to get up. Chiang Kai-shek hurriedly signaled him to lie down, and quickly walked to the bed, shook Hu Zongnan's hand, and also tried Hu Zongnan's forehead affectionately to see if there was any fever. This moved Hu Zongnan very much. He burst into tears on the spot and said choked, "Look, I'm here..."
Hu Zongnan worked for Chiang Kai-shek for more than 30 years, and made great contributions to Chiang Kai-shek's crackdown on dissidents and consolidating his rule. Chiang Kai-shek also obeyed and highly appreciated him. After resigning from Taiwan, Hu Zongnan was disgraced and no longer had any glory in front of Chiang Kai-shek. Chiang Kai-shek was lukewarm and had no intention of comforting him.At the time of death, Chiang Kai-shek visited him in a hurry, which made Hu Zongnan feel like a special honor, and was so moved that he communicated with tears. How sad!
htmlAt around 3 a.m. on December 14, Hu Zongnan, who was sleeping, suddenly screamed and raised his hands high. Yuan Xueshan refused to respond. When he pressed his raised arms high, it was so hard that it could not bend. He hurriedly rang the bell to summon the doctor. The doctor immediately gave Hu Zongnan a heart acupuncture and used an oxygen mask. After hearing the news, his wife hurriedly led her children to the hospital from home, but at this time Hu Zongnan had entered a state of dying and said nothing. At 3:50, Hu Zongnan died of a heart attack at the age of 66.
talked about Hu Zongnan's death, and his second son Hu Weishan admitted , "Of course his illness has something to do with his mood. His later state was a depressed death." When Hu Zongnan died, Hu Weishan was only 11 years old.
Reference
"The Last Ending of the Forty-Three War Criminals of the Kuomintang", He Ming, Party History Press,
"The Last Years of Father Hu Zongnan's Depressed Death", Hu Weishan, Chinese Story
"The Finale of the Kuomintang's High Officials Going to Taiwan", Yang Fan, Chinese Publishing Press,
"Hu Zongnan Retreats Taiwan", Jing Shenghong, a Hundred-year Tide
