The Battle of Crossing the River was an important battle for the China People's Liberation Army to destroy the Kuomintang army's Yangtze River defense line, occupy Nanjing and overthrow Chiang Kai-shek's rule in the War of Liberation. It is another strategic decisive battle to annihilate the main force of the Kuomintang army on a large scale after the three major battles.

The three major battles wiped out more than half of the main force of the Kuomintang army, and the Nanjing government was in jeopardy. On New Year's Day (1949), Xinhua News Agency issued a New Year message and put forward the slogan of "crossing the Yangtze River and liberating all China". On April 26th, Mao Zedong and Zhu De issued the order to March to the whole country. Chiang Kai-shek, who contracted his front to the Yangtze River, tried to save the crisis by relying on the natural barrier of the Yangtze River. Under the leadership of the General Front Committee composed of Deng Xiaoping, Liu Bocheng, Chen Yi, Su Yu and Tan Zhenlin, the People's Liberation Army launched the River Crossing Campaign on the evening of April 20th 1949. Millions of mighty men crossed the Yangtze River on the front of more than 500 kilometers from Hukou in the west to Jiangyin in the east, and the "Yangtze River Defense Line" that Chiang Kai-shek painstakingly built for three months was destroyed. On the 23rd, the People's Liberation Army occupied Nanjing. Since then, the People's Liberation Army has successfully marched into all parts of the south of the Yangtze River, thus liberating the whole of China.