Chapter 448: Japan Sues for Peace

Chairman Chiang's ambiguous attitude made Tang Qiuli puzzled, and the old man seemed to be trying his best to avoid a question: Will Japan continue to expand the war? Or will you stop the invasion of China?

When Tang Qiu left other channels and learned that Japanese Foreign Minister Hashitaro Kono, with a large foreign delegation, had arrived in Shanghai, all his doubts and incomprehensions suddenly became clear, and he clearly grasped the thoughts and pulse of Chairman Jiang, and also understood why Chairman Chiang could tolerate the repeated actions of the Japanese army in North China, but only in Shanghai, he took out his own family background and fought to the death with the Japanese army.

The Military Committee headed by Chairman Chiang considered that it would be more convenient to fight in Shanghai than to fight in the Great Plains in the far north, and all the military supplies of the Central Army came from the areas of Jiangsu and Zhejiang, which were also the territory traditionally controlled by Chairman Chiang, and could avoid the Japanese army, which had the advantage of mobility, and the water network in the area south of the Yangtze River was the natural nemesis of the Japanese army's mechanized troops.

Moreover, Shanghai is an international metropolis with foreign concessions, and a war here is very likely to cause the intervention of the great powers, and if it is fought well, it may win a glorious peace with foreign mediation, and then thwart the Japanese army's ambitions in North China, which is extremely powerful for China, which is relatively weak.

At that time, Chairman Chiang pinned his hopes on the sanctions imposed by the foreign powers to intervene to stop Japanese aggression, and he never broke off this idea, and the battle of Songhu was forced too much by the Japanese to do it, and the purpose of the "fight" was to better "talk" in the future, and I am afraid that he still hoped for a decisive battle in Shanghai, which could easily lead to the intervention of the international community, and given China's national conditions at that time, it was impossible to allow Chairman Chiang to stand still in Shanghai and sit back and watch the Japanese army deploy in Shanghai at will. Public opinion and the princes will really suspect that the central government of Nanjing has a tacit understanding with Japan.

At that time, the League of Nations was going to convene a meeting of the "Nine-Power Pact" in Brussels, Belgium, on 3 November to discuss the Sino-Japanese war, and Chairman Chiang pinned his hopes on the League of Nations meeting.

Chairman Chiang said: "The nine-nation pact meeting of the League of Nations has a great deal to do with the fate of the country, and I ask the troops at the front to make greater efforts to support the Shanghai battlefield for another period of time, at least 10 days to two weeks, so as to gain strong sympathy and support in the international community. ”

It can be seen that Chairman Chiang at that time was not optimistic about the prospects and outcome of the Battle of Songhu, and he used the word "tǐng", and tǐng stood up and spoke at the League of Nations, because there were too many interests of the great powers in Shanghai, and he did not believe that those powers could sit idly by and watch the Japanese monopolize their interests in China.

As a result, the result of the Battle of Songhu was so victorious that he was unexpected, and the Japanese army never made any moves, and the forces in Shanghai were uprooted, and it happened that Japanese Foreign Minister Kono Hashitaro came to Shanghai again and expressed his intention to seek peace, and he judged that on the one hand, Japan was in Shanghai and suffered heavy losses, and on the other hand, it was afraid of the nine-nation pact meeting of the League of Nations, and was afraid of international sanctions, and had to be at the negotiating table.

In the mind of the chairman of the General Committee, the deterrent power of the League of Nations should exceed the victory of the Chinese defenders in the battle of Shanghai, and in this case, negotiating with Japan can take advantage of the time and place and grasp more initiative, Tang Qiuli understood too well that the so-called "international intervention" was pure fantasy, at that time appeasement was prevalent in Europe, Britain and France acquiesced in Hitler's Germany's occupation of the Sudetenland, and the Western powers would never turn their faces against Japan, which had already stood on the threshold of the great powers, for the sake of China, which had been extremely weak for a century, and take a chestnut in the fire for China.

The current attitude of the Japanese toward peace, to cover up their sinister intentions, was to buy time for the next larger-scale attack, and at the same time, it was also to paralyze the Nationalist Government, especially Chairman Chiang, who at that time was overjoyed that the Japanese, who had always been fierce and arrogant, could take the initiative to seek peace, believing that this was an unprecedented event in a hundred years.

From the late Qing Dynasty to the early years of the Republic of China, that time was not forced to sign an alliance with the great powers, they were all beaten by others, and after looking for teeth all over the ground, they were forced to sign various agreements to lose power and humiliate the country, but this time, the Japanese took the initiative to sue for peace, which was an unprecedented victory in the history of military and foreign affairs.

Zhang Zhizhong, who was on the front line in Shanghai, and a small number of high-ranking generals in the national government were worried about this, because they might not be able to see through the turbulent international situation, but with the experience gained from the bloody battles with the Japanese, they instinctively felt that things were not so simple, and how could the Japanese be willing to stop because of a defeat. And in North China and Chen Bing millions.

At the beginning of the war against China, they thought that as long as they attacked China's newly established industrial zone and military and political center, and at most blocked China's coastline, China would absolutely give in, and China would have the ability to retreat to the backward areas in the southwest, and still be able to confront Japan?

Therefore, at that time, the argument of "destroying China within three months" was very loud in Japan, and the whole country was convinced of this, and in less than 20 days after the start of the war, Japan lost its troops in North China and suffered heavy losses, and the strategic concept of deciding North China in World War I and then going south to the Central Plains was not only not realized, but the Japanese army in North China was beaten and retreated in the Pingjin area, and there was no way to fight back.

Subsequently, although the troops were massively increased, Tang Qiuli's North China Independent Division, with its tough attitude and superb combat effectiveness, could not be broken up or driven away, and firmly entangled more than one million Japanese troops in North China and could not move, and the war in North China came to a stalemate, and there was no sign of change in a short period of time.

At this time, the base camp of the Japanese army was extremely angry and anxious about the results that ran counter to the original judgment and calculation, Japan is an island country with limited resources, and it is absolutely impossible to consume endurance and tenacity to compete with China, a behemoth power, so the only way is to fight a quick battle, and even strike hard, and beat China, a giant with feet of clay, to the ground in one go, so as to quickly end the war against China, and then compete with the Russians in the north for Siberia, and in Southeast Asia and the Pacific with the United States, Britain and other Western countries.

The Japanese base camp was desperately seeking an effective way to break the current stalemate and end the war against China as much as possible, and at this time, the navy's idea of fighting south prevailed, and because of the army's successive defeats in North China, the base camp acquiesced to the navy's plan to move in the direction of Shanghai.

The Japanese Navy's idea was theoretically feasible, but it also had a clear intention to compete with the army for merit, and it ran counter to the army's strategic plan of moving from North China to the south to the south of the Yangtze River.

On the first day of the war, the navy was beaten by the squadron and vomited blood, losing the two bases in Hongkou and Yangshupu that had been operating for six years, and the Japanese Marine Corps troops stationed in Shanghai were completely wiped out, losing all face, and the navy had no choice but to throw this mess to the army.

The result was still a miscalculation, Matsui Shigen's Shanghai dispatch army was beaten to the point of dying, unable to fight again, and could only hide in the open sea to swim dàng, the Japanese army base camp felt that the situation was serious, and the war against China seemed to have become far away, which was an unacceptable result for the Japanese, and the domestic formed divisions and regiments had all been sent to the Chinese battlefield, and there were no troops at hand.

It takes time to re-recruit reservists and form new divisions, so there is also the scene of Japanese Foreign Minister Kono Hashitaro coming to Shanghai to sue for peace, which is obviously a smoke bomb, covering up the actual action of Japan's domestic conscription, paralyzing the national government to relax its vigilance, relax its armament, and make a comeback.

After Tang Qiuli analyzed the Japanese attempt, he did not mention it to anyone, including Chairman Jiang, at this time, can the old man believe it? If you go to play a funeral song, it will not be good, and you will be charged with sabotaging the peace talks, so why bother

He sent a telegram to Brother Qiusheng that the East China Army should now vigorously strengthen its fortifications, strengthen the training of its fighters in anti-landing operations, and build a wide range of anti-landing obstacles within its own defense line, and at the same time, transfer four regiments of 12,000 troops from the Jiang Yanming Division of the Huangya Dòng Garrison Brigade to supplement and strengthen the strength of the Sulu Mobile Corps, including two infantry regiments, one heavy artillery regiment, and one air defense regiment.

The garrison regiment Chinese s of the counties in the base area of the Taihang Mountains were immediately upgraded, supplementing the strength of the Huangya Dòng Garrison Brigade, and forming new garrison regiments in each county.

On 2 October, Tang Qiuli received an urgent telegram from Nanjing, asking him to immediately rush to Nanjing to attend the Sino-Japanese peace talks and take up the post of deputy head of the Chinese delegation, which was headed by Wang Chonghui, then acting minister of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Gao Zongwu, director of the Asian Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and composed of 16 members, including General Zhang Zhizhong, who was now commander of the Shanghai garrison, and Yu Hongjun, then mayor of Shanghai, and as many as 10 military representatives.

For this telegram, Tang Qiuli was stunned, he was not good at this kind of work of fighting lawsuits, and he didn't like it, maybe he saw the ugly faces of the Japanese, and it was hard to say that he killed a few people on the spot, it became a big news in the world, besides, what is there to talk about with those Japanese brutes.

First of all, those soldiers on Chinese soil are nòng back to their hometowns, so that there is a basis for negotiation, not to mention, the Japanese do not really want to talk, just to buy time, they are polite on the surface, and hide knives behind their backs, and now he, when he sees the Japanese, he will go straight to the fire, kill one, one less, and those guys, what nonsense is there to talk about?

Later, when I calmed down and pondered the list of members of the delegation, I couldn't help but smile when I found the mystery in it.

****