The car was crowded with refugees and students who had fled Beiping. Worried that the Japanese army would fire, a white flag was hung on the front of the car. When the car crossed the Lugou Bridge, it drove very slowly. Zhao Zhenying can even see that in the distant Japanese positions, Japanese officers are observing the train with binoculars.
On this side of the railway is the position of Kuomintang (KMT) 29 army. The two armies of China and Japan confront each other, and war is imminent. The bus full of civilians slowly passed through the middle zone, and the 20-year-old high school graduate suddenly felt humiliated.
Zhao Zhenying's original dream was to be admitted to Peking University. However, with the "July 7th Incident" on the Lugou Bridge, this dream was completely shattered. From that moment on, he, like many warm-blooded young people at that time, gathered in the historical torrent of resisting Japan and saving the country, determined to drive the invaders out of China.
In the following eight years, the young officer's combat footprint spread all over many provinces-Hunan, Sichuan, Guangdong and Yunnan. Because of his excellent performance, he was promoted all the way. 1944 In April, 27-year-old Zhao Zhenying was already a major battalion commander when he joined the Chinese Expeditionary Force to fight in India and Myanmar.
Although I have been fighting for many years, I spent most of my time as a staff officer in the military department. After he became a battalion commander, the army has always been a reserve, and there are few opportunities to really fight on the battlefield. As a soldier, this became a great regret in his military career.
However, history soon gave him an opportunity to attract public attention.
The New Sixth Army of the Kuomintang in Zhao Zhenying is known as the "trump card in the trump card" of the Kuomintang army, and its commander Liao Yaoxiang is Chiang Kai-shek's favorite pupil. 1In August, 945, the Anti-Japanese War drew to a close, and Chiang Kai-shek named the New Sixth Army to enter Nanjing. He wanted to show China's military strength to the surrendered Japanese with this powerful division equipped by the United States.
On August 28th, 1945, the first battalion of Zhao Zhenying flew from Zhijiang, Hunan to Nanjing. From the moment he jumped out of the engine room and set foot on the land of Nanking, Zhao Zhenying and his soldiers were destined to go down in history-it was the first time that the China army regained the capital after eight years of arduous anti-Japanese war.
Subsequently, the battalion commander with the rank of major was appointed by oversight to be responsible for the vigilance work of the signing ceremony of the Japanese surrender letter on September 9, 1945. In the eyes of many participating troops, this task is regarded as "the highest honor for China's participating soldiers".
As a researcher of the history of the Anti-Japanese War, Yan Huan is very familiar with the whole process of the Nanjing surrender ceremony on September 9, but Zhao Zhenying's description has added many unknown details to him.
The signing ceremony of surrender was held in the auditorium of Nanjing Central Military Academy. From the entrance of the auditorium to the street outside, a flagpole is erected every 50 meters, wrapped in blue and white cloth, and the flags of China, the United States, Britain, France and the Soviet Union are hung on the flagpole.
Under each flagpole, there stood a fully armed and energetic battalion of soldiers. They wore green khaki American military uniforms, helmets and white gloves, military backpacks and American submachine guns. In order to prevent fire, the soldiers' guns were not loaded.
At the signing ceremony, Zhao Zhenying was in the left rear of the surrender seat of the Japanese delegation, and his soldiers were all over the venue. The number and position of these soldiers were arranged by Zhao Zhenying the day before and have been rehearsed repeatedly.
During the 65,438+00-minute signing ceremony, Zhao Zhenying was the only one who could walk around the venue freely. His task is to always pay attention to the military posture of his subordinates and prevent accidents.
What shocked Yan Huan even more was that Zhao Zhenying even found a suspected figure in the old photos of the surrender ceremony taken by American journalists at that time. The main part of this old photo is China's surrender seat and Japanese surrender seat, but in the lower left corner of the photo, behind a row of soldiers, stood an officer with a vague face, wearing breeches, boots and a pistol at his waist, and his clothes were obviously different.
"This person may be me." In Zhao Zhenying's memory, as the highest officer of the security forces in the venue, in order to show his military power, a few days before the surrender ceremony, he specially went to the tailor's shop near the venue to order a set of breeches uniform.
And the story in the photo and autograph book, Zhao Zhenying also remember very clearly.
Shortly after the surrender ceremony,1October 6, 1945, 10, the officers' club of the New Sixth Army opened in Nanjing. All the officers above the battalion level of the new Sixth Battalion were present. At that time, they were heroes and winners admired by everyone. On the right of the top row of officers, Zhao Zhenying found his smiling face.
Subsequently, the US military liaison officers in the New Sixth Army also completed their tasks and left China. Before he left, Major Wang Yuanyuan Sotheby's took out this red notebook and asked the China officers present to sign it as a souvenir of this period of hope and glory.
The Nanjing surrender ceremony is the most prominent page in China's modern history. This is the first time that the Chinese nation has won the war against foreign aggression in the past hundred years. This has also become the proudest experience of Zhao Zhenying's life. Although after more than 60 years, the old man still remembers the mood at that time.
"A little nervous, but more excited!" The old man's face inadvertently revealed a sense of pride. "Since the Sino-Japanese War, China has never won a battle. After eight years of anti-Japanese war, the Japanese finally surrendered! I can witness all this with my own eyes, glory! "
However, the young major battalion commander would never have thought that his once proud glory would soon become bleak. First diluted, then trampled, and then gradually withered. Like fallen leaves, it was swept to the most secret corner of the heart by its owner and hidden for decades.