In mid-August, Soviet troops under the command of Zhukov launched a full-scale offensive on a thirty-kilometer front. The Soviets committed a total of about 57,000 troops, supported by artillery and air forces. As early as before the war, Zhukov asked Stalin that the high command must transfer two tank divisions and one mechanized artillery division from southern Europe, Transcaucasia, and Belarus to the Nomenkan front within a month. In addition, Zhukov demanded the rapid increase of three aviation divisions and four mechanized anti-aircraft artillery regiments.

Zhukov had come to China in 1938 to serve as the chief military adviser to the Nationalist Government, and he was very familiar with the combat capabilities and methods of the Japanese army. It turned out later that Zhukov's measures were very necessary, and if it were not for his absolute superiority in technology and equipment, the Soviet army would have reaped a fiasco. Fortunately, Stalin agreed to Zhukov's request.

What about the Japanese army? Before the war, a surprising thing happened. The quartermaster of the 23rd Division committed suicide.

Why do you commit suicide? It turned out that before the expedition, the Japanese army judged through aerial reconnaissance that there were about 1,000 tanks and armored vehicles of the Soviet army in the area of the Haraha River (that is, the area around Nomenkan), with a strength of about 8 to 100,000, and the Japanese army lacked ammunition at that time, and there was a shortage of various artillery shells, and the expedition team could hardly get artillery support.

Under such circumstances, the Japanese high-ranking still insisted on attacking and outnumbered the people, so the quartermaster of the 23rd Division felt incomprehensible. At that time, the entire artillery reserve of the Japanese Kwantung Army at that time was not enough for a combat unit (on average, only 30% of each artillery unit was engaged in combat), which caused extreme concern among the quartermasters of the 23rd Division, who strongly demanded that the division and the Kwantung Army Headquarters cancel this combat operation. It was believed that the disputed area and the west bank of the Haraha River had been confirmed at that time, and the Soviet army had gathered a large-scale tank unit, and the Japanese army sent the 23rd Division, which was not very strong, to attack when there was a serious shortage of artillery shells, and I was afraid that it would suffer a serious blow and fail!

But this proposal to stop the attack was rejected by the 23rd Division and the Kwantung Army Command. The impression of the Soviet army on the top generals of the Japanese army was still stuck in the period of the Russo-Japanese War, and the basis for their operations was still the "old experience" of the Russo-Japanese War that "once the Russian army is cut off from the rear route, it will immediately collapse on all fronts." The Kwantung Army believed that the combat effectiveness of Mao's army was very low, and the heroic Japanese army was completely capable of defeating the superior Soviet army with a large number of tank support without artillery support, so it not only did not follow the advice of the quartermaster of the 23rd Division. Instead, they blamed it for lack of confidence. Not a qualified Imperial soldier. As a result, the quartermaster of the 23rd Division could not bear the pressure and committed suicide while the troops were dispatched.

What the Kwantung Army did not expect was that although the Soviet army was ugly, Zhukov was there. It hasn't crashed. As a result, the poorly prepared Japanese army was passive. Due to the lack of ammunition. Soon it switched from offensive to full-fledged defense. Zhukov waited for this opportunity, and as soon as they retreated, the Soviet army immediately pressed up.

The decisive battle has begun!

The Soviets attacked in three directions.

The northern flank was the first to attack with mechanized infantry. Attract Japanese reinforcements. In the center, the main force of the Japanese army was pinned down with infantry. On the southern flank, an infantry division and an armored brigade, about 10,000 men and 300 tanks, combined with artillery and air force, made a rapid detour to the north and surrounded the Japanese troops east of the river from the flank.

On August 20, Soviet troops crossed the Haraha River.

The Japanese army's combat strategy was to block the enemy's attack with the front-line troops, wait for the Soviet army's offensive power to weaken, and then surround the Soviet army from the flank with reinforcements. However, the Soviet Union's blitzkrieg-style three-dimensional mobile operations, especially the heavily invested armored troops, quickly broke through the Japanese defense line.

On August 24, the northern and southern flanks of the Soviet army were encircled at Nomenhan. The main force of the 23rd Division of the Japanese Kwantung Army was surrounded by regiments, and the 7th Division, which came to reinforce it, turned around and ran away in fright.

On August 27, the Japanese 23rd Division also broke through after a hard battle, but suffered huge losses.

After the war, the Soviet Union declared a great victory, completely annihilating more than 60,000 people of the 6th Army of the Japanese Kwantung Army, taking 3,000 prisoners alive and losing 4,000 of its own. Japan also claimed victory, but did not disclose its own casualty toll.

According to the archives declassified after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the true death toll of Soviet troops was about 8,000, more than 1,000 were missing, and another 16,000 were wounded. The report submitted by the Military Medical Department of the 6th Army of the Kwantung Army to the top of the army indicated that the number of Japanese killed was 7,696, the number of wounded was 8,647, and the number of unaccounted for was 1,021.

In terms of technical equipment, the Soviet army lost more than 350 armored vehicles and 250 aircraft; The Japanese lost 30 tanks and 180 aircraft.

It can be seen from this that although the Soviet army achieved the last victory, the losses were much greater than those of the Japanese army, and it was a crushing victory at best. In fact, the 23rd Division, which was the main force of the Japanese army, was not an elite unit, and many officers and soldiers were on the battlefield for the first time, but they played very well. This should be attributed to the excellent military training and excellent technical and tactical level of the Japanese army.

After World War II, when a journalist interviewed General Zhukov about the most difficult moment in his life, he replied that it was the Battle of the Harakha River. Zhukov's evaluation of the Japanese army is that the junior officers are very good and the fighting is fanatical, but the higher you go, the worse it becomes, especially the senior generals born with a golden spoon can only be described as incompetent.

In fact, it was not completely incompetent, the main thing was that Emperor Hirohito opposed a full-scale conflict with the Soviet Union in the event of an undecided war in China and forbade the supply of supplies to the Kwantung Army. After the battle reached the worst, the Kwantung Army could not continue, and collected about 80 artillery pieces together with the artillery assigned to the 23rd Division at the beginning, and delivered a total of 19,000 shells to the front line, and this shell was equivalent to 75% of the total ammunition reserve of the Kwantung Army at that time!

Vasily who later served in GRU (Main Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff of the Russian Federation Army, or GRU). Colonel Novo Branetz was involved in the campaign. In his recollections, he believed that the Soviet army had many flaws in the battle, and that it was won by huge casualties and superior weapons. For example, the Soviet army's ammunition consumption reached 31,000 tons, which is equivalent to 15% of the consumption of the Kursk campaign. On the Japanese side, 82 artillery pieces were stockpiled 30,000 rounds of ammunition for the offensive in the July offensive, with an average of 366 rounds per gun, which was roughly an average of 30% of each gun's combat ammunition, far lower than the standard of about 50% of each gun's combat ammunition in the Chinese theater in 1937.

The reason why the Soviets fought so badly. Mainly, the continuous suppression of rebellion has seriously affected the morale and combat effectiveness of the troops. Anyone who has read the relevant anti-anti-anti-anti-corruption materials knows that the people who have been rectified are basically those with outstanding abilities, and as a result, the whole thing has come and gone, and the outstanding talents have been swept away. The rest of the officers and soldiers were also afraid that one day they would fall on their heads.

At that time, the Soviet army was generally cowardly, and many officers and soldiers fled, forcing Zhukov to replace two division commanders who insisted on retreating, and ordered the tank driver to be locked in the tank! It can be seen how dangerous the situation was at that time.

IT IS WORTH MENTIONING THAT THE JAPANESE ARMY UNIT 731 USED BACTERIOLOGICAL WEAPONS FOR THE FIRST TIME IN THIS BATTLE: A DEATH SQUAD WAS SENT TO PUT ANTHRAX INTO THE HOLSTEN RIVER UPSTREAM OF THE SOVIET ARMY'S WATER SOURCE, BUT THE EFFECT OF THE ILLNESS CAUSED TO THE SOVIET ARMY WAS NOT GOOD. It was reviewed that it was due to the loss of bacterial activity in water. Only one Japanese soldier was infected and died. There is information in China that claims that it caused 1,200 deaths to the Japanese army, and if it is true, then 731 is really a big oolong.

At the same time as the war between Japan and the Soviet Union, the Anti-Japanese Union operating in Changbai Mountain also suddenly dispatched. In this plane. The living conditions of the Anti-Japanese Union (mainly the First Route Army) were much better than in history.

Kun Feng took the opportunity to do business. Quietly brought the intelligence officers of Yan'an to the northeast. and connected with Commander Yang Jingyu. Yan'an then ordered the Anti-Union to stop carrying out the previous erroneous plan, that is, the blind command of Wang Ming and the Soviet Far East Bureau. Zheng Weiguo also sent a special combat team and a sniper platoon to cooperate with them.

At that time, it happened that the traitor Cheng Bin was like a mad dog and destroyed the secret camp of the Anti-Japanese Federation, which was also a secret material supply point. The special operations team will count the calculations. Directly ambushed outside a secret camp, ten of the best snipers joined forces to snipe, and killed more than ten hardcore traitors such as Cheng Bin and Zhang Xiruo on the spot. This action allowed a large number of secret camps to be preserved.

In the ensuing operation of merging families and villages with the Japanese army, it was the special combat team that took the lead and attacked several "group tribes" one after another by means of unwitting means, forcing most of the puppet army and the puppet regime to become a two-faced regime.

However, in general, the situation of the Anti-United Nations is still quite unfavorable. The main reason is that the rule of the Japanese army in the northeast has been basically consolidated, and the living standards of the people outside the Guanxi have even exceeded the living standards of the people in the enemy-occupied areas and the areas under national control. Especially along the railway line and in big cities, if you are the employees of large enterprises such as the Manchurian Railway, it can even be said that you have reached the level of moderate prosperity.

Those who have watched "Red Lantern" know that there is an employee named Li Yuhe on the Manchurian Railway, and just a signal worker can support three families on wages. Although it is only to maintain the most basic food and clothing, this is unimaginable in Kannai.

In history, before Yang Jingyu died, Zhao Tingxi, the pseudo-captain who betrayed him, also persuaded him: "I think you should surrender, now Manchukuo does not kill those who surrender." ”

In fact, the so-called guerrilla warfare behind enemy lines is not really behind enemy lines, and it is inseparable from the support of the common people. If the mass base is lost, the army will not be able to survive. Therefore, Zheng Weiguo thought twice and suggested that the central government withdraw all the Anti-Japanese Resistance League to the customs for centralized training.

Taking advantage of the fact that the Japanese army was fighting with the Soviet Union, the First Route Army of the Anti-Japanese Union quickly advanced to the northeast and successively broke many strongholds of the Japanese army. Then, the main force of the enemy was pinned down with small troops, and the large troops quickly jumped out of the encirclement of the Japanese army in four directions and rushed straight to the national border.

Before leaving the country, the First Route Army also easily broke several Japanese strongholds and rescued more than 8,000 laborers, most of whom later joined the Anti-Japanese Federation. After arriving in the territory of the Soviet Union, the 1st Army merged with the 2nd and 3rd Routes, and then returned to China via Outer Mongolia through the Soviet Union.

This unit caused a great sensation after returning to China, and even Chang Kaishen had to give the name of the 39th Infantry Division of the National Revolutionary Army (supposedly to commemorate their return to China in 39). Division commander and political commissar Yang Jingyu, deputy commander Zhao Shangzhi, deputy political commissar Wei Zhengmin, chief of staff Zhou Baozhong, and director of the Political Department Li Zhaolin. There are three regiments under the jurisdiction of the division, which were reorganized from the three route armies of the Anti-Japanese Alliance, and there are more than 20,000 people in total, including the rescue of laborers and the technical and technical units deployed in Yan'an.

However, the chairman of the committee used the technique of habitual longitudinal and itchy skills for a while, so he still gave Yan'an a little eye medicine, and subordinated this division to the Northeast Advance Army and put it under the command of Ma Zhanshan. Unexpectedly, Yan'an agreed without saying a word, which made Chang Kaishen distrust Ma Zhanshan, and the food began to be short for no reason, but in this way, Ma Zhanshan and Yan'an got closer.

After the anti-coalition troops returned to China, they had just finished reorganizing and caught up with a big war. The new commander of the North China Front, Okamura Ninji, finally showed his minions after pretending to be his grandson for several months. This first battle was chosen in Suiyuan.

After the Battle of Nomenkan. The Japanese finally chose to compromise, and Stalin confirmed that the Japanese had no intention of advancing north for the time being, and relations between the two sides eased, and an armistice was signed in October 39.

Okamura Ningji realized that this was an excellent opportunity, and attempted to blitzkrieg the Wuyuan region in Suixi, eliminate Fu Zuoyi and others, and then march to Ningxia and Gansu to completely cut off this material channel. To this end, Okamura Ninji also prepared a large number of supplies, which also included a large number of means of transportation, including 5,000 trucks and 10,000 mules and horses.

Mid-October 39. The Japanese army made a big move. The 26th and 32nd Divisions, as well as the 35th, 36th, and 37th Divisions, which had just arrived in North China, were mobilized to attack Suixi.

In the face of a menacing and strong enemy, Fu Zuoyi adopted the tactic of luring the enemy into depth, and cleared the vast depth of 160 kilometers along the road from Baotou to Wuyuan. Fortunately, it is Suiyuan. Vast but sparsely populated. And it's prepared. Otherwise, it really can't be done.

There has also been extensive damage to the roads, mainly by digging pits for irrigation. Although it cannot deal with tracked vehicles, it is very troublesome for wheeled vehicles. Due to insufficient supplies. The officers and men of the Japanese army on the front line soon fell into the situation of filling their stomachs with cold rice balls.

The Japanese army trekked hard every day hungry, and the flanks were constantly attacked and harassed by the Daqingshan guerrillas, and their morale dropped sharply. However, the heavy army group of five divisions and regiments is obviously not something that the Suiyuan National Army can compete with, and Okamura Ningji also successfully took Wuyuan after the most defeat. However, after entering the city, the Japanese army, who were preparing for the "carnival", were immediately disappointed, because the residents had already retreated to Linhe County, which was further west. All the Japanese had worked so hard to get was an empty city.

When Zheng Weiguo was preparing to build a base in Suixi, he took into account that Wuyuan was not very safe, because this place had been captured by the Japanese army in history. It was suggested that Fu Zuoyi push the logistics base to the west or south. Fu Zuoyi personally investigated, and finally decided to move all the industrial facilities to Linhe. Wuyuan, as an advance base, only tuntian, does not run large industries, so it is convenient to retreat.

There is still nearly a hundred kilometers from Wuyuan to Linhe. With the logistical supply capacity of the Japanese army, it is indeed difficult for them to advance 500 miles continuously in a place where there is no railway. Okamura Ninji did not dare to continue fighting in the end, but chose to withdraw as soon as possible, and threw the seven divisions of the puppet Mongolian army in Wuyuan as cannon fodder.

As soon as the Japanese army withdrew, the 35th Army, the 81st Army, and the Northeast Advance Army rushed up, easily ate the puppet army of the seven divisions, and then took advantage of the victory to pursue. At this time, most of the large-caliber machine guns of Deshka had been equipped with the troops, and the tanks and planes that the Japanese army relied on as their backers were greatly reduced, so they had to flee in confusion.

The cunning Okamura ordered the Japanese army to spread poison along the way, in an attempt to kill and injure the pursuing troops with mustard gas. However, the Chinese army, which had been prepared for a long time, was not fooled, and the various units rarely resorted to tail-following pursuits, but more often used parallel pursuit and over-pursuit pursuits, tearing off large pieces of meat from the retreating Japanese ranks from time to time. When the Japanese finally escaped back to Baotou, at least more than 1,000 corpses were left on the way.

At the same time as the Japanese army attacked Suixi, the Chinese troops in Jizhong, Zhongtiao Mountain and other places also launched a diversion attack at the same time. Zheng Weiguo personally commanded the three main armies of the Jicha Theater to surprisingly surround the independent mixed 7th Brigade in Cangxian, and then lured the 34th Division to come to the rescue, and finally completely annihilated the independent mixed 7th Brigade and the 34th Division. As a result, Okamura Ningji's heavy defensive circle on the periphery of Jizhong was completely broken.

Nakajo Mountain also performed well. In order to strengthen the combat effectiveness of the troops in this direction, Zheng Weiguo specially helped Wei Lihuang set up a training base. All units can take turns to enter the base for training, and the units that have cooperated well with Jizhong and Yan'an have all been given this opportunity, such as Sun Weiru's Fourth Group Army and Wei Lihuang's 14th Army are the first batch of troops to complete the retraining and training.

In this counterattack operation, the 14th Army attacked from the front, cleared the forward positions of the Japanese army, and dragged the 20th Division to the death with the main force against the main force. The 4th Army was divided into several routes, interspersed and detoured with battalions, and almost wrapped the 20th Division in dumplings.

The commander of the First Army, Yoshio Shinozuka, was in a hurry and hurriedly ordered the 108th Division and the 109th Division to go south to relieve the siege. Wei Lihuang also transferred a large number of reinforcements, and the two sides fought fiercely for nearly a week, and the situation was very bad, and the supplies and ammunition were almost exhausted. However, the Japanese army still had a slight victory in overall strength, and finally forced the Nakajo Mountain National Army to break the siege.

Although this battle was not fought, it greatly boosted the morale of all units of the Nakajo Mountain National Army. Although the Japanese kept the 20th Division, they ran out of supplies. Moreover, the Eighth Route Army took the opportunity to attack along the Tongpu Railway and major highways, and although it was piecemeal, the results were quite rich. These two in and one out quietly changed the situation on the battlefield.

After Okamura led a large army to come back, he thought that he would soon be able to recover his previous situation, but what he didn't expect was that the situation was even worse. The main problem is the problem of logistics and supply, so many of the materials that Okamura looted before were saved from the mouths of the troops of the North China Front, and the cars, mules and horses also exhausted their material resources and connections.

After this battle, the Kwantung Army wants to be supplied, the Central China Front Army is supplied, and the South China 21st Army is supplied. Moreover, Japan gave priority to the development of the navy, and the total amount allocated to the army was not large.

Okamura finally came up with a way to feed the war with war, and asked all troops in North China to bear half of their own supplies, which originally happened in 41 years, but it was actually 39 years ahead of schedule, which shows that the Japanese army is walking quickly on the downhill road. For a modernized army, once it loses its normal provisions, its combat effectiveness will rapidly deteriorate, and its will to fight will also decline sharply.

In the parallel space, as soon as the Japanese army engaged in this kind of warfare, the number of Japanese troops who surrendered increased dramatically, and there were even cases of a small group of Japanese soldiers surrendering with guns. In order to have enough to eat, the Japanese child soldiers in Shanxi simply found a landlord and old wealth to be their godfather, which shows how poor and sour they are.

But Okamura is Okamura in the end, not only can he come up with bad ideas, but he can also think of some poisonous plans! This time was no exception, he was secretly arranging and almost made the national army suffer a big loss. (To be continued......)

PS: Well, there are two more chapters to wrap up!