[Anti-Japanese Iron Blood King] Chapter 829: Salivating Southeast Asia (Ask for subscription!) , ask for a monthly pass, ask for everything! ）

The fierce battle between China and Japan at the Xinqiang River attracted the attention of the melon-eating masses at home and abroad, and this battle was the largest battle launched by the Japanese army in central China after the occupation of Wuhan, and it was also the first large-scale battle carried out by the Japanese army after the establishment of the Wang puppet regime. Pen "Fun" Pavilion www.biquge.info

In fact, after the Japanese army captured Wuhan, the war of resistance entered a protracted stage. Due to the large area occupied by the Japanese army and too many **** resistance forces behind the enemy, the strength of the army was weak and the offensive force was greatly reduced.

At this time, the Japanese army in China had reached its limit, and although there was still some strength left to launch an attack, it was necessary to mobilize the garrison troops in the rear to make up for the gap in the defense of the first line. It's like a beggar's torn clothes, pull it up to protect your chest, and your ass is exposed. If you pull it down to protect your buttocks, your chest will be exposed again.

That being said, the 11th Army, the most powerful Japanese army in China, was able to mobilize about 200,000 troops to launch a full-scale attack. Therefore, at this stage, the initiative on the battlefield is still in the hands of the Japanese army. Militarily, the Japanese still had a fairly overwhelming advantage.

After the Battle of Pingjin, the Battle of Nankou, the Battle of Taiyuan, the Battle of Songhu, the Battle of Nanjing, the Battle of Xuzhou, the Battle of Lanfeng, the Battle of Wuhan, the Battle of Nanchang, and the Battle of Suizao, the Japanese army suffered hundreds of thousands of casualties, and its combat effectiveness was considerably lost. Moreover, because the control area is too wide, the resistance force behind the enemy line is too strong, and it is unable to carry out continuous offensive operations similar to the Battle of Songhu and the Battle of Wuhan, which use hundreds of thousands of troops.

As a result, from the beginning of 39 to the present, Okamura Ninji and his successor Ananweiji can only launch this kind of offensive in central China with a force control of tens of thousands of people, so as to maintain a high-pressure posture against the Nationalist government.

However, the weakening of the Japanese was obvious to all, so after the Battle of Wuhan, both China and Japan began to adjust their strategies and tactics. On the Chinese side, Chiang Lao held a meeting in Nanyue to assign the tasks of the second phase, that is, the strategic defense phase. Because the main purpose of the stalemate stage was to let the Japanese army fall into the quagmire of war for a long time, suffer huge losses, and could not win, so they were dragged down and dragged to death.

Later, at the meeting, Lao Jiang made two deployments: the first is? The troops were divided into three parts, with a third of the troops facing the Japanese on the front line, a third of the troops training in the rear, and another third fighting behind enemy lines.

Front-line troops and units behind enemy lines, when necessary, are rotated by one-third of the troops prepared in the rear, so as to maintain combat effectiveness. This style of play, in addition to maintaining long-term combat capability, also forced the Japanese to ignore the head and tail, greatly weakening his strength.

And second? It has been repeatedly emphasized that the **** does not emphasize the gains and losses of one city and one place at this stage, and the main purpose is to consume the living forces of the Japanese army in order to achieve the goal of dragging down the Japanese army.

And the Japanese side also made some measures, and the Japanese side began to prepare for a protracted war, because it began to think that it would fight for a year at most, because the Japanese side was not prepared at all, and the production capacity of military factories was seriously insufficient. Therefore, at this time, the Japanese army began to organize new divisions and regiments, expand military production, and train a large number of young people of appropriate age to prepare for protracted warfare.

At the same time, knowing that the war would be difficult to resolve within a few years, the Japanese army was eager to use China to contain China and withdraw from China as soon as possible. In addition to luring the **** generals to surrender, they also fully supported the puppet regimes in various places.

In addition, the Japanese army believes that the troops on the front line still have a huge advantage in combat effectiveness after all, and it is imperative to maintain the momentum of the offensive and carry out offensive operations against the troops. Because the Japanese army understands very well that **** still has a strong force, if the Japanese army turns to defense, I am afraid that **** will take the initiative to attack. Therefore, the Japanese army must maintain its offensive and seize the initiative on the battlefield.

In order to fight for a long time, it was also because Hitler's mustache was too dazzling in Europe, which greatly stimulated the ambitions of the Japanese, so the Japanese began to seek long-term foreign expansion. To this end, the Japanese government convened three successive imperial councils and eight four-phase meetings to unify thinking.

Several important ministers, including Japanese Prime Minister Fumima Konoe, agreed that if the Imperial Japanese Army defeated the French army in Indochina and the British army in Burma as quickly as possible, as well as the Dutch troops stationed in Indonesia and other islands in Southeast Asia, the Japanese Empire would not only be able to obtain a large amount of war resources, including oil, in a short period of time.

At the same time, it can also cut off the Yunnan-Burma Highway, the only external route of the Chinese government, so the Japanese government deems it necessary to talk to the above-mentioned countries.

According to the "Outline for Handling the Current Situation in Accordance with the Evolution of the World Situation" drawn up by the Japanese Government some time ago, the attitude of the Japanese Government from top to bottom on the settlement of the Sino-Japanese war has decided to shift to a long-term and protracted posture, so the Japanese Government is now concentrating its attention on the south.

The results of these months on the battlefield of the national debt in Europe have shocked the Japanese, and the French government has completely surrendered, although de Gaulle formed a government in exile in England, which is nothing more than a joke in the eyes of the Japanese. And the Queen of the Netherlands, who fled to England, did not pose the slightest threat to the Germans, except for shouting a few empty slogans. Belgium, Luxembourg, Denmark, Norway and other countries have not improved at all, and the whole of Europe has basically maintained a state of temporary calm.

The fact that the European countries are still in a half-dead state and that Germany has no intention of making peace talks is also very exciting for the Japanese, and the German government has promised that they have no intention of interfering in Asian affairs, let alone in Southeast Asia, is undoubtedly a signal to the Japanese. So the Japanese decided to try the depth of the water and see the attitude of the Europeans.

The first country that the Japanese government came into contact with was the Netherlands, which had its own glorious era, once the Netherlands was known as the sea coachman of Europe, and was once a country with strong economic and naval strength, and when the Netherlands was at its strongest, its overseas colonies were hundreds of times the size of its land area, including Taiwan, China, which was once its colony.

Even now that the Netherlands has declined, and most of its overseas colonies have been divided between Britain and France, the Netherlands still has a large number of colonies in Asia, especially in Southeast Asia, and these colonies are all under the management of the Dutch East India Company.

There was a reason why Japan had the idea of the Dutch East Indies, and the Dutch colonies in Asia were mainly concentrated in what would become Malaysia and Indonesia. Of course, it also includes Brunei, which is the kingdom of rubber and oil, and in the thirties and forties of the twentieth century, it was known as the treasure trove of oil in East Asia, with an annual output of about 8 million tons, about 20 times that of Japan.

At this time, Japan needed about 5 million tons of oil a year, but its self-sufficiency was less than one-tenth. In order to obtain land on the mainland, in order to obtain more war resources, and in order to win the war, Japan has long been eyeing the weak country of the Netherlands. The declining Netherlands seems to Japan, like China, to be the kind of little kid who crawls all over the ground with gold in his hand, and is born to cause crime.

However, the Netherlands has always been a wise country, and when the war broke out in 1939, the policy of the Netherlands was unmistakable, and the country, which had experienced a hundred years of peace, was determined to pursue a "resolute and unspoken policy of neutrality", and which, although a member of the League of Nations, had made it clear that it was not bound by the mandatory maintenance of collective security resolutions.

Although its national sentiment was biased towards the British, it did not mind doing business with Germany, as it did during the First World War. The Netherlands may have been on high alert for a German invasion and had made some preliminary preparations, but at the same time it continued to express its dissatisfaction with the British naval blockade, which it believed was an obstacle to normal trade between neutral countries.

There are quite a few parties in the Netherlands, but thankfully, both the communists are at the far left end of the political spectrum. Both the Industrial Party and the far-right Nazism were in a position of fundamental insignificance. Because of the correct policy of the Netherlands, although its national strength was not strong, its status in the country was not low, so before they decided to start a war with Britain and France, the Japanese did not attack the Netherlands, although they were greedy.

However, this was no longer the case, and after a short 5-day battle, the Netherlands was quickly conquered by the Germans. And the weakness of the Dutch completely stimulated the Japanese, and it was really a pipe dream and a whimsical idea to have most of Southeast Asia with this strength. At the end of March 1940, in accordance with the decision of the "Outline for Handling the Current Situation," the Japanese Government sent Kobayashi Kazuzo, Minister of Commerce and Industry, to the Dutch East Indies to negotiate closer economic relations between the two countries. (To be continued.) )