A reference to a counterattack in self-defense conducted by the Eighth Route Army to check the military attack of the Kuomintang diehards during the first anti-Communist onslaught launched by Chiang Kai-shek. Between the winter of 1939 and the spring of 1940, the Eighth Route Army smashed the attacks on the anti-Japanese base areas in southern Hebei and Taihang launched by Kuomintang diehards Shi Yousan and Zhu Huaibing.