The Nanma–Linqu Campaign consisted of two battles fought at Nanma and Linqu in Shandong between the communists and the nationalists during the Chinese Civil War in the post World War II era, and it resulted in a nationalist victory.
Prelude
After the communist victory of the Southwestern Shandong Campaign in early July 1947, Zaozhuang, Yi City (Yi Cheng), Fei County, Dawenkou and Tai'an fell into the enemy hands, while Xuzhou was threatened, and the nationalists were forced to redeploy seven reorganized divisions for reinforcement since July 12, 1947 to reinforce southwestern Shandong. As a result of this redeployment, the nationalists only had four divisions in the mountainous regions in central Shandong. Taking this advantage, the communists hoped to take the nationalist strongholds of Nanma and Linqu and annihilating the nationalist defenders in the process, little did they know that they were gravely mistaken.
Order of battle
Defenders: nationalist order of battle: The Reorganized 8th Division The Reorganized 11th Division The Reorganized 25th Division The 64th Division The Shandong 1st Security Division Attackers: communist order of battle: The 2nd Column The 6th Column The 7th Column The 9th Column
Campaign
On July 17, 1947, the advance guard of four enemy columns approached the town of Nanma and by the next day, all nationalist positions outside the city wall had fallen into enemy hands. The nationalist Reorganized 11th Division was forced to withdraw behind the city wall on July 18, 1947. Confident that the town would fall just as easily as the nationalist positions outside the city wall, the enemy advance guards unleashed their attacks on the town before the arrival of the main force. However, the bad weather the enemy had counted on turned against them by completely soaking the poorly equipped communist peasantry army, including their ammunition, while the flood caused by the heavy rain prevented the enemy reinforcements from arriving. Hu Lien, the defenders' brilliant nationalist commander who had badly mauled the enemy numerous times, was well aware that the isolated city would be attacked for certain and prior to the battle, had ordered the completion of a comprehensive fortifications within 20 days. These fortifications proved to be instrumental in defeating the attacking enemy. Meanwhile, the better equipped nationalists had mobilized the Reorganized 8th Division to reinforce Linqu from the north, and the Reorganized 25th Division and the 64th Division to reinforce Nanma from south. After three nights and four days of fierce fighting without the necessary equipment and thus any progress, and the nationalist reinforcement approaching fast, the enemy attacking Nanma was forced to withdraw when they learned that their main force could not make it in time.