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The first PLA tank force action took place during the first phase of the Huai-Hai Campaign. Chen Yi's PLA Fourth, Sixth, Eighth, Ninth and Thirteenth column, and the Special Column's tanks and artillery managed to encircled four KMT armies of ten divisions deployed around Su County. Simultaneously, the right flank of Liu Po Cheng's PLA force drove the KMT Eighth Army back toward XinAn. The defection of the KMT 77th and 59th Corps on November 9 allowed the PLA Third Field Army to thrust across the Lung-Hai Railroad, and blocked all of the American trained and equipped KMT 5th Corp's attempt to rescue the trapped KMT troops.

In nine days, the Communist forces succeed in isolating the battlefield, and destroyed the KMT Second, Seventh, Thirteenth, and Sixteenth Army. Only 3000 KMT troops escaped and join the main KMT force in XuZhou. The remaining 77,000 were either killed or captured. While the KMT tried to reconstitute a new defensive line around XuZhou, but their reinforcement was blocked by the timely arrival of the PLA Central China Field Army. The 300,000 plus isolated Nationalist troops had no choice but to evacuate the city. The seven PLA East China Field Army columns followed in pursuit with light infantry units. By Dec 4, 1948 they caught up with the fleeing KMT troops and trapped them in Shuangduiji, southwest of Su Country. Among the trapped were KMT 5th Corp and the elite KMT 18th Corp commanded by Huang Wei, who was considered being the KMT's best. The KMT forces quickly fortified their defense and waited for their relief columns. After the arrival of PLA artillery and armored units, the PLA commander Chen Yu, and Su Yu methodically constricted the KMT's 15km defensive circle with the support of the Mechanized Division and one of the heaviest artillery bombardments in the Chinese Civil War conducted by the PLA force.