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In war-themed film and television dramas, everyone must be familiar with the organization of armies, divisions, brigades, regiments, battalions, companies, platoons, and squads.

However, the above organizational structures are not necessarily connected one level at a time; for example, you may think that a division must have brigades under it, but in fact it is also common for a division to directly command a regiment.

Moreover, even if they are organized into the same division or regiment, their specific strength numbers are very different, or even too different.

Taking the newly formed 1st Army at the time of the victory of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression in 1945 as an example, the army had 3 divisions and 9 regiments, with a total strength of more than 45,000 people.

If we looked at the organization of the Shanxi-Suiyuan Army during the same period of time, we would probably be shocked.

Shortly after the victory of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, the Shangdang Campaign began.

When the troops led by Shi Zebo were surrounded by our troops in the Shanxi-Hebei-Shandong-Henan Military Region, Yan Xishan immediately ordered reinforcements and claimed that "Shangdang must be fought for and reinforcements will arrive."

In order to reinforce Shi Zebo's troops, Yan Xishan ordered Peng Yubin, deputy commander-in-chief of the 7th Army, to lead the 23rd Army, the 83rd Army (lacking 2 regiments), 2 artillery regiments and part of the 3rd and 2nd Armies of the Provincial Defense Army, totaling more than 21,000 people.

There are almost two armies here, but why is the strength only 21,000 people?

Aren’t the two armies of Yan Xishan less than half the strength of the newly formed 1st Army?

——Yes, this was the special situation of the Shanxi-Suiyuan Army at that time.

If we break it down further, the truth may be even more shocking.

At that time, the 23rd Army was under the jurisdiction of the Provisional 40th Division, the Provisional 46th Division, and the Provisional 47th Division, and was assigned an artillery regiment; the 83rd Army was under the jurisdiction of the Provisional 49th Division, the Provisional 50th Division, and the 66th Division, and was assigned an artillery regiment.

The Shanxi-Suiyuan Army was organized at that time as one division with three infantry regiments. Because two of the above-mentioned troops did not come along, in terms of the number of regiments, the two armies had a total of 16 infantry regiments plus two artillery regiments.

These two armies were the main forces of the Shanxi Suiyuan Army, and because they incorporated the Shanxi puppet army (Note: most of these puppet armies were previously the Shanxi Suiyuan Army, or were related to the original Shanxi Suiyuan Army generals), there was also a part of the puppet army that was reorganized into the so-called provincial defense army.

Its number was the 8th Division of the 3rd Army of the Provincial Defense Force, with a total of 3 regiments participating in the battle; in addition, there was the 13th Regiment of the 5th Division of the 2nd Army of the Provincial Defense Force; in this way, the Provincial Defense Force system had a total of 4 infantry regiments.

Therefore, the Shanxi-Suiyuan Army reinforcements led by Peng Yubin consisted of a total of 20 infantry regiments, plus 2 artillery regiments; in addition, there were 3 army headquarters and direct units (Note: the direct unit of the 3rd Army of the Provincial Defense Army participated in the war), 7 division headquarters and direct units.

And these troops only totaled 21,000 people.

Why did this happen? How many people did a regiment of the Shanxi-Suiyuan Army have at that time?

First, due to the special situation of the Shanxi-Suiyuan Army at that time, most of its army and division levels actually only had division headquarters, and very few direct-affiliated teams, and perhaps only necessary communication units.

Therefore, even though there are more than ten army headquarters and division headquarters, they may only have a total of one or two thousand people.

The actual strength of the two artillery regiments assigned at that time was actually a battalion. These two artillery regiments, together with the army, division headquarters and Peng Yubin's command headquarters, had at most two to three thousand people.

The remaining approximately 18,000 to 19,000 people belong to the 20 infantry regiments, and the average strength of each infantry regiment is actually more than 900 people.

According to the standard organization, the infantry regiment of the Shanxi-Suiyuan Army should have had more than 1,500 people. However, by the late period of the War of Resistance Against Japan, the Shanxi-Suiyuan Army's manpower had serious problems. It was difficult to meet the full staffing of the regiment-level troops, and adjustments were also made to its organization.

The original organization of the Shanxi-Suiyuan Army Infantry Regiment was that one regiment had three battalions, each battalion had three infantry companies + one machine gun company, in addition to a mortar company and a communications platoon directly under the regiment.

Because the Shanxi-Suiyuan Army was actually equipped with few heavy machine guns at that time, the three machine gun companies in the organization disappeared and were reduced to heavy machine gun platoons, which were combined with the mortars in the regiment to form a machine gun company directly under the regiment.

And because there were not many mortars, this combined company actually did not have many people.

In this case, the actual strength of an infantry regiment of the Shanxi-Suiyuan Army was approximately 1,200 to 1,300 people; due to the shortage of troops, the actual strength of one of its regiments was only over a thousand people, and because there were some troops left behind, only more than 900 people could finally be deployed to participate in the war.

Among these more than 900 people, 9 infantry companies try their best to ensure combat personnel, with a total strength of about 800 people, an average of about 90 people in each company, and about 9 people in each squad, plus the company and platoon leaders and the cooking squad.

The remaining 100-odd people were from the regiment headquarters, three battalion headquarters and the machine gun company.

Because the number of people is insufficient but the organization is there, the entire regiment is basically composed of combat soldiers, and there are very few service support soldiers.

Therefore, the fighters of the Shanxi-Suiyuan Army carried heavy loads and were more easily fatigued in field battles. Our army seized these characteristics and eventually wiped out most of the more than 20,000 reinforcements.