from the Luodai to Longquanyi District (referred simply as Longquan by the local populace). Battle of Longquan While the battle of Luodai was raging on, several thousand bandits attacked Longquanyi District from two different direction, with one thrust from Baihe (柏合) Township, and another from Ping'an (平安) Township. The local communist garrison only totaled seventy, but there was an armory where mortars stored. Fifteen minutes after the bandits launched their attack, they were bombarded by mortar fires, which successfully checked the bandits' advance. The next day, communist reinforcements consisting of two Battalions of Chengdu Garrison Regiments arrived. Despite absolute numerical inferiority, the communists decided to launch a counterattack on the bandits, correctly deducting that despite enjoying absolute numerical superiority, the bandits would not fight as a cohesive unit because none of them would want to fight and die for others. Just as it had occurred in the earlier two battles, the bandits behaved exactly as the communists had predicted and despite having five thousands members, the bandits' offensive completely collapsed and every bandit started to immediately flee from the battlefield after suffering only four dozen fatalities, when attacked from both sides. As the communists begun their mopping up operation at the same night at Baihe Township, all of the seventeen bandits who failed to flee from the area were captured alive by the communists. The communist victory of the battle of Longquan marked the end of the organized battles in the local area. Although the mopping up operation would last until end of the year, with another dozen smaller battles to be fought, all of the surviving bandits in the local area were completely eradicated by the end of the year. Political offensive and pressures from the communists played an important role in their success in that many of the bandits surrendered, and most of them was reeducated, finally switched to the communist side. Outcome Although sharing the common anticommunist goal, the nationalist guerrilla and insurgency warfare was largely handicapped by the enlistment of bandits, many of whom had fought and killed nationalist troops earlier in the eradication / pacification campaign, and also looted, kidnapped and even killed landlords and business owners, an important faction that supported the nationalist government, but now must united against the common enemy, which is half-hearted at the best. Compounding the problem further with additional differences within the ranks of the nationalist guerillas themselves, the