918 Sino-Japanese war again: Japan's anti-China preparations

In September 1939, Yoyogi in Shibuya, Tokyo, Japan, was originally a forest and wasteland, and was named "Yoyogi" because it has produced a large tree called "Yoyogi" for generations. Since the Meiji Restoration, this land that was originally used for planting trees has been used by the Japanese Army as a training ground.

After decades of operation, this Yoyogi training ground now has an area of 540,000 square meters, and has also built a large playground, shooting range and barracks. However, the main role of this Yoyogi training ground is not to train troops, but to serve as a place for the Japanese emperor to review the troops. However, from the end of 1938, the training ground, which was originally open to civilians, suddenly became a military restricted area, and high brick walls were erected around the training ground, and the engineers of the brigade were transferred from all over Japan to work day and night inside the wall, and artificially built the appearance of complex terrain such as mountains, woods, mud fields, and sand dunes. In the planning of the Japanese Ministry of Army, this Yoyogi training ground will be turned into a test base for Japan's new army weapons and equipment, just like the Yexian weapons test site in Henan, China.

In the first few days of September 1939, the security of this military restricted area became even tighter, and a high barbed wire fence was erected outside the high wall, and the military police of the brigade were patrolling and guarding everywhere, and personnel without special passes could not get close to the Yoyogi training ground within 3,000 meters. In the dead of night, German heavy trucks with huge horsepower dragged "secret weapons" wrapped in canvas into the training ground, which was surrounded by barbed wire and fences. From time to time, the roar of a huge motor can be heard from the direction of the training ground to the residential areas around Shibuya. It seems that there are dozens of heavy tanks there to interview the appearance of the car! The Japanese devils who had been disturbed from their sleep were all excited, and no one complained to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government......

On this night, two Japanese-made limousines came to disturb people's dreams as if they were in the excitement, roaring across the road in Shibuya, until they reached the door of the Yoyogi training ground. The Japanese military police guarding there went up to check the pass, and when they saw that it had been issued by the Ministry of the Army, they immediately let it go, and the two sedans drove along a military highway in the Yoyogi training ground, and they passed through several strange "terrains" in seven corners and eight bays, passed several checkpoints, and finally stopped at the door of a heavily guarded barracks. A stocky soldier in the uniform of a Japanese lieutenant general stood straight. As soon as the car stopped, the door couldn't wait to open, and the first to jump out of the car was a Japanese Army Nakasa, and then the Japanese Minister of War General Nagata Tetsuyama came down! The Japanese lieutenant general greeted him and saluted with a snap: "Your Excellency the General." Nagata Tetsuyama returned the salute with a smile: "Yoshida-kun, the equipment has already been tested, right?" The result? Are you satisfied?"

This Yoshida is Lieutenant General Yoshida To, commander of Japan's latest "mecha army." The so-called mecha army is actually the meaning of the armored army, although the armored corps of Japan started earlier, but it was subject to the weak base of heavy industry, and the development has been relatively slow, until the "anti-Soviet war" in 1937, there were only a few tank wings. However, when the example of millions of Soviet Red Army troops being crushed by the armored forces of China and Germany was vividly put in front of the Japanese military leadership, they finally made up their minds to start accelerating the development of armored forces. Several tank wings were expanded into tank brigades, and the "mecha army", modeled after the Chinese and German armored armies, began to be formed after the end of the Western European campaign. At the same time as the expansion of the armored forces, the Japanese army also accelerated the pace of research on new tanks, especially after the "Pearl Harbor Attack" in November 1938, Japan's relations with Germany quickly became closer, and their research and development of new tanks naturally received help from the Germans. The equipment in Nagata Tetsuyamaguchi just now is a newly developed combat vehicle with the help of the Germans - the Zero Assault Tank!

Yoshida seemed to be very satisfied with this tank that the Germans helped design, and laughed: "Very good."

The practicality of the Zero assault tank is very

And the cost of production is also relative

Definitely a tank made for the Imperial Army! Moreover, its 48 times caliber 75mm tank gun theoretically also poses a certain threat to the 110mm frontal armor of the Chinese No. 4 tank. Speaking of this, he sighed softly again: "The only regret is that this assault tank appeared too late, if it had been equipped a few months earlier, maybe the Mexican campaign would not have been like that." ”

Nagata Tetsuyama smiled and patted him on the shoulder: "Victory and defeat are a common thing in soldiers, a small setback is nothing, as long as the Imperial Army can learn enough lessons from this defeat and pay attention to the construction of armored forces, it will be worth it." In fact, there is something in Nagata's words, it has always been not that the army does not pay attention to the construction of armored forces, but that the Japanese government has not given the army enough budget. And after the news of the defeat of the Mexican campaign came, Konoe Fumiro finally gritted his teeth and increased the budget of the army a lot.

While the two were talking, they saw a number of Japanese generals coming out of the barracks, Major General Masao Terada, chief of staff of the Mecha Army, senior staff officer Kuanbang Osa, combat staff officer Tatsutaka Nakasa, staff officer Isamu Seguchi, and Major General Hoshino Toshimoto, commander of the First Tank Brigade who had made General Patton's First Panzer Corps an "infantry brigade" in Mexico. The group saluted Nagata Tetsuyama Tachimasa, and Nagata also returned the salute with a smile, and when it was the turn of Major General Hoshino Toshimoto, who was a little gray, Nagata also deliberately shook his hand and comforted: "Hoshino-kun, the First Tank Brigade has done its best in Mexico, and from a tactical point of view, it cannot be judged defeated, but it has retreated because of the defeat of the battle." ”

Hearing this, Hoshino Toshimoto shook his head slightly and sighed: "Your Excellency, the humble First Tank Brigade is indeed defeated, although the losses of the Americans are not less than ours, but they have thirty times the industrial strength of the empire!" Mechanized warfare is, in the final analysis, still fighting for national strength! The empire is too weak in this regard. ”

Nagata frowned, industrial weakness is not something that can be changed in a day or two, Japan lacks resources, the domestic market is narrow, and after losing the resources and markets of Chinese mainland, industrial development is of course difficult. But you can't stop invading others just because the industry is weak, right? If you miss this opportunity, it will be even more difficult to develop in the future. He said twice, pointed to a few "Zero Assault Vehicles" that were improved on the basis of the "No. 2 Assault Gun" in the open space of the barracks, and said: "Hoshino-kun, if your First Tank Brigade had such advanced tanks during the Mexican Campaign, you must be able to defeat the US army!" ”

Hoshino Toshimoto looked at these "assault chariots" and nodded: "The Zero assault chariot is indeed a very sharp weapon, and it is much stronger than our Type 97. If we had such weapons at that time, of course, we could inflict greater losses on the US military, but it was not enough to rely on them to defeat the United States, and the Americans had too many tanks. ”

"Hoshino-kun! Watch your words! Yoshida reprimanded loudly. Although everyone present knew that Hoshino was telling the truth, they all pretended to grit their teeth. Only Nagata Tetsuyama is not a fake, he shook his head and smiled: "Hoshino-kun is right, the industrial power of the United States is 30 times that of Japan, and Mexico is at the doorstep of the United States, but it is separated from Japan by a Pacific Ocean. It is indeed impossible for Japan to become the main force in the anti-US war, and it will be Germany that will really defeat the United States. As he spoke, his face became grim: "And the main imaginary enemy of Japan's tank troops is still China!" Hoshino, if there is such a Zero assault tank, will your 1st Tank Division have the confidence to defeat the three armored divisions of the Chinese? ”

"The 1st Tank Division! It's mine? Hoshino Toshimoto's face was full of incredible expressions, a general like himself should have found a place where no one was there to secretly commit suicide, and now it is very unreasonable to be cheeky and steal his life, I didn't expect to be promoted!

"How? Are you sure it's okay? ”

"Of course, Your Excellency!" Hoshino Toshimoto snapped and replied loudly: "The First Chariot Division of our Imperial Army will definitely be an invincible division that will sweep across the East Asian continent!" ”

Nagata Tetsuyama smiled faintly and nodded at Hoshino, as if to express his appreciation. Then he walked into a conference room that had just been set up in the barracks with Yoshida and others, and began to listen to Yoshida and others about the performance test reports of the "Zero Assault Fighting Vehicle" and several other army combat vehicles and armored vehicles.

Of course, the test report of the new weapon is satisfactory, whether it is a Zero assault tank that has been finalized and ready to be put into production, or a "heavy tank" that is still in the secret research and development stage, or a "Type 97 assault tank" cobbled together with the chassis of the "Type 97 medium tank" and a copy of the ZIS-1 anti-tank gun of the former Soviet Union, and finally it has been blown into a cutting-edge combat vehicle that "can fight with the No. 4 tank" by several leaders of the "mecha army"!

However, Admiral Nagata's eyebrows gradually twisted, not because he was dissatisfied with these chariots, but because seeing them made Nagata think of the superpower on the western continent! Public opinion in China suddenly began to "demonize Japan" during this time, and although China's disarmament plan had already been formulated, it had not begun for a long time! Moreover, there is intelligence that China's military budget for 1940 will be the same as that of 1939, and that China's navy, army, and air forces have large-scale plans to retool.

What frightened Nagata and the Japanese military leaders even more was that China had not long ago publicly declared the Pacific Ocean north of the 42nd parallel and the high seas of the Sea of Japan a demilitarized zone! The Japanese Navy ships were forbidden to enter, and at the same time, the combat ships of the Beiyang Fleet were dispatched to patrol near the 42nd parallel, and two days ago they openly opened fire on Japanese ships trying to cross the 42nd parallel! If it weren't for the Japanese ships forbearance, instead of returning fire, they took the initiative to retreat south of the 42nd parallel, and the Sino-Japanese war might have broken out.

All indications indicate that with Japan's decisive victory in the war in Eastern Australia, Chinese imperialism could not wait to provoke a war with Japan for colonies. In the face of the threat of war that had already arrived, in addition to asking the German side to intervene, the Japanese top brass also began to adjust their strategic layout, shifting their focus from North America to the defense of the western Pacific and eastern Australia.

In this regard, the Japanese army and navy are doing their best to prepare for war, and the navy naturally pins its hopes on the "kamikaze special attack team"; in addition to recruiting and training a large number of kamikaze members, it has also launched several suicide aircraft and suicide torpedo development programs, in addition, the navy also obtained a good performance fighter zero carrier-based aircraft in early 1939, and finally has a fighter capable of fighting a war.

The Army's preparations are mainly focused on two aspects: one is to speed up the development of the atomic bomb, and strive to use the 50 kilograms of high-purity uranium-235 provided by Germany to make at least one atomic bomb in 1940! The second is to speed up the formation of a "mecha army" for decisive battles on land. The four tank brigades formed earlier (the second, third, and fourth tank brigades and the tank training brigade) were expanded into tank divisions, and a large amount of manpower and material resources were also used for the development and production of two "secret weapons", the "Zero Assault Tank" and the "Type 97 Assault Tank". In addition, the Japanese army and navy also took advantage of the South Pacific route that had just been opened up to import a batch of oil from South America, bringing Japan's strategic oil reserves to 3 million tons! Moreover, after two years of large-scale investment, the oil fields in North Sakhalin Island now have an annual output of nearly 800,000 tons.

However, even the most optimistic senior Japanese generals did not believe that Japan alone could defeat the mighty China with this little strength of its own. The idea was simply to drag out the war and try to withstand Chinese pressure before the United States was destroyed by Germany. As long as the United States survives until the demise of the United States, Germany, out of consideration for containing China, will definitely come forward to defend Japan, and it is a big deal to cede some of Indonesia's or Philippine colonies to China in exchange for peace, as long as it can keep Eastern Australia, everything will be fine.

"Your Excellency, according to the plan, the Mecha Army will have four chariot divisions. Each tank division has four tank brigades, including two heavy tank brigades, each equipped with 60 Zero assault vehicles, and two medium tank brigades, each equipped with 60 Type 97 assault vehicles; In addition, it will be accompanied by a 105mm self-propelled artillery brigade, an air defense combat vehicle brigade, a mechanized engineering brigade, a mecha power search brigade, a mechanized maintenance brigade, a motorized infantry wing, and a motorized baggage wing. After the report on the weapons inspection, the commander of the mecha army, Yoshida Bi, began to talk about the equipment of the mecha army, "If a tank division is to be fully manned, excluding reserve tanks and vehicles, it will need 240 combat vehicles of various types, 18 self-propelled guns, 108 armored vehicles, and more than 800 trucks and other special vehicles. As he spoke, he took a breath and said with emotion: "If you have all four chariot divisions, you will need thousands of chariots alone!" ”

Hearing Yoshida's words, Nagata only shook his head and smiled bitterly in his heart, he had done his best to supervise the expansion of tank production, but so far, the production capacity of medium and heavy tanks per month is only about 100 vehicles, which is still possible to achieve under the condition of replacing tanks with assault guns with relatively simple production costs and processes! With this capacity, it will take only one year to meet the needs of four tank divisions. If there is a war with China, I am afraid that a big question mark will be drawn whether this output can make up for the huge consumption on the battlefield!

He smiled bitterly and replied, "Yoshida-kun, I understand what you mean, the Ministry of War will definitely go all out." At present, 60 Zero assault vehicles have rolled off the assembly line, and 120 Type 97 assault vehicles have been assembled. In addition, there is a batch of parts for assembling the Zero assault guns that are being shipped from Germany, and with this batch of parts, we will soon be able to assemble another 180 Zero assault guns, so you can use these 240 Zero assault guns to form four brigades and assign them to the various tank divisions. The production of Type 97 assault combat vehicles is relatively large, and by the end of October at the latest, another 180 will be produced, and it can also be organized into four brigades and assigned to each division, so let's do it first, and the remaining eight tank brigades will be temporarily equipped with Type 97 medium combat vehicles. ”

A look of disappointment flashed on Yoshida's face, the Type 97 medium tank is not a live target on the battlefield! Each armored division of the Chinese has a battalion of No. 4 and a battalion of No. 3 assault guns. Probably seeing Yoshida's thoughts, Nagata Tetsuyama sighed and said, "The Germans' combat preparations for attacking the United States are almost complete, and it is estimated that the war will start in October at the latest!" With what I know about Luo Yaoguo, he will also go to war against us before the end of October! So I had to make do with it first and deploy the troops in place. ”

"Deploy by the end of October?" Yoshida gasped, although he had just boasted that he was going to sweep through Chinese mainland, but now he thought that he was really going to war with China's eight armored divisions, and his scalp was really a little numb.

Nagata nodded silently, "Yes, it must be in place by the end of October, and two of the tank divisions are deployed to North Korea." There were also two tank divisions and the Mecha Corps command to Australia. His face became extremely solemn. Western Australia has four armored divisions of the Chinese Panzer Army! And the terrain there is conducive to mechanized warfare Yoshida-kun, please you must defeat the Chinese armored divisions! Please! As he spoke, he slowly stood up and bowed deeply to the generals of several mecha armies in the conference room, as if he pinned the fate of Japan on them.