| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
The Hundred Regiments Offensive (Chinese: 百团大战) (August 20 – December 5, 1940)[1] was a major campaign of the Communist Party of China's Red Army commanded by Peng Dehuai against the Imperial Japanese Army in Central China. The Second Sino-Japanese War ( July 7, 1937 to September 9, 1945) was a major war fought between the Republic of China and the Year 1940 ( MCMXL) was a Leap year starting on Monday (link will display the full 1940 calendar of the Gregorian calendar. Northern China or North China ( literally "China's north" is a Geographical region of China. The People's Liberation Army ( PLA) ( is the unified Military organization of all land sea and air forces of the People's Republic of China. The National Revolutionary Army ( NRA) ( sometimes shortened to 國軍 or National Army) was the National Army The was a Field army of the Imperial Japanese Army during the Second Sino-Japanese War. The Imperial Japanese Army ( IJA) ( Kyūjitai: 大日本帝國陸軍 Shinjitai: ja 大日本帝国陸軍 Romaji: Dai-Nippon Teikoku Peng Dehuai ( ( October 24, 1898 - November 29 1974) was a prominent military leader of the Communist Party of China, and was a general in the Imperial Japanese Army in the Second Sino-Japanese War. Events 636 - Battle of Yarmouk: Arab forces led by Khalid ibn al-Walid take control of Syria and Palestine Events 63 BC - Cicero reads the last of his Catiline Orations. Year 1940 ( MCMXL) was a Leap year starting on Monday (link will display the full 1940 calendar of the Gregorian calendar. The Communist Party of China ( CPC) ( also known as the Chinese Communist Party ( CCP) is the founding and ruling political party of the The People's Liberation Army ( PLA) ( is the unified Military organization of all land sea and air forces of the People's Republic of China. Peng Dehuai ( ( October 24, 1898 - November 29 1974) was a prominent military leader of the Communist Party of China, and The Imperial Japanese Army ( IJA) ( Kyūjitai: 大日本帝國陸軍 Shinjitai: ja 大日本帝国陸軍 Romaji: Dai-Nippon Teikoku China ( Wade-Giles ( Mandarin) Chung¹kuo² is a cultural region, an ancient Civilization, and depending on perspective a National
Contents |
Background
Between 1939 and 1940 the Japanese occupiers launched more than 109 small campaigns involving around 1000 combatants each and 10 large campaigns of 10000 men each to wipe out Communist guerrillas in the Hebei and Shandong plains. ( Postal map spelling: Hopeh) is a northern province of the People's Republic of China. ( is a coastal province of eastern People's Republic of China. In addition, Wang Jingwei's anti-Communist puppet government had its offensive against the CCP guerrillas. Wang Jingwei ( Traditional Chinese: 汪精衛 Simplified Chinese: 汪精卫 Pinyin: Wāng Jīngwèi Wade-Giles: Wang Ching-wei ( In addition, there was a general sentiment among the anti-Japanese resistance forces, particularly in the Kuomintang, that the CCP was not contributing enough to the war effort, and that they were only interested in expanding their power base. It was out of these circumstances that the CCP planned to stage a great offensive to prove that they were helping the war effort and to amend KMT-CCP relations.
The Battle
The Japanese North China Area Army estimated the strength of communist regulars to be about 88,000 in December 1939. Two years later they revised the estimate to 140,000. On the eve of the battle the Communist forces grew to 400,000 men strong, in 115 regiments. The extraordinary success and expansion of the Eighth Route Army against the Japanese led Zhu De and the rest of the military leadership to hope that they could engage the Japanese army and win. The Eighth Route Army ( was the larger of the two major Chinese communist forces that formed a unit of the National Revolutionary Army of the Republic of China which Zhū Dé ( Wade-Giles: Chu Te zi: Yùjiē 玉阶 1 December 1886 – 6 July 1976 was a Chinese Communist miltary leader and statesman Mao Zedong argued that the war against Japan would be protracted, and that communist strategy should emphasize guerrilla warfare, political mobilisation and the building up of base areas. Mao Zedong ( 26 December 1893 – 9 September 1976) was a Chinese Military and political leader who led
Order of Battle: Hundred Regiments Offensive
Nevertheless, by 1940 growth was so impressive that Zhu De ordered a coordinated offensive by most of the communist regulars (46 regiments from the 115th Division, 47 from the 129th, and 22 from the 120th) against the Japanese-held cities and the railway lines linking them. Hundred Regiments Offensive Aug 20th - Dec 5th 1940 China 8th Route Army (38th Group Army - Marshal Peng Dehuai From 20 August to 10 September communist forces attacked the railway line that separated the communist base areas, chiefly those from Dezhou to Shijiazhuang in Hebei, Shijiazhuang to Taiyuan in central Shanxi, and Taiyuan to Datong in northern Shanxi. Events 636 - Battle of Yarmouk: Arab forces led by Khalid ibn al-Walid take control of Syria and Palestine Events 506 - The Bishops of Visigothic Gaul meet in the Council of Agde. Administration The Prefecture-level city of Dezhou administers 11 county-level divisions, including 1 district, 2 county-level cities Shijiazhuang ( literally "The Stones' Village" is a Prefecture-level city and the Capital of Hebei province, China ( Postal map spelling: Hopeh) is a northern province of the People's Republic of China. Taiyuan ( lit "Great Plains" is a Prefecture-level city and the capital of Shanxi province China. ( Postal map spelling: Shansi) is a province in the northern part of the People's Republic of China. Datong ( is a city in the northern Shanxi Province in China, and is located a few hundred kilometres west by rail from Beijing with an elevation of They succeeded in blowing up bridges and tunnels and ripping up track, and went on for the rest of September to attack Japanese garrisons frontally, taking excessive casualties (22,000 regulars, compared to Japanese losses of 3000 or 4000). In all, about six hundred miles of railways were destroyed and the Chingching coal mine, which was important to the Japanese war industry, was rendered inoperative for six months. It was the greatest victory the CCP fought and won during the war. However, from October to December the Japanese responded in force, reasserting control of railway lines and conducting aggressive "mopping up operations" in the rural areas around them.
Aftermath
When General Yasuji Okamura took command of the North China Area Army in the summer, the new approach was "Three All" meaning kill all, burn all, and destroy all in those areas containing communist forces. was a general of the Imperial Japanese Army, and commander-in-chief of the China Expeditionary Army from November 1944 to the end of World War II. The Three Alls Policy (三光作戦 Sankō Sakusen;) was a Japanese Scorched earth policy adopted in China during World War II, the three alls The population of the communist base areas dropped dramatically and communist operations were severely limited, with CCP forces reduced to 300,000 men. Communist control was also reduced to 10 out of 437 counties in North China. Mao used the subsequent rectification campaign to reassert his personal authority over the party and over military strategy, and this meant the abandonment of any serious communist challenge to the Japanese position in North China for the rest of the war. The Communists would only engage the Japanese in guerrilla tactics and concentrate on rebuilding their own foothold in north China.
Peng was criticized by Mao for revealing the number of the Communist forces to the Kuomintang. Thus the Hundred Regiments Offensive became the last of the two major Communist frontal engagements against the Japanese during the war. During the Cultural Revolution, Peng's action was one of the pretexts used by the Gang of Four that led to his downfall. The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution in the People’s Republic of China was a struggle for power within the Communist Party of China that manifested into The Gang of Four ( was the name given to a leftist political faction composed of four Chinese Communist party officials
It is worth noting that, although the Communists were rarely involved in major upfront combat against the Japanese, the CCP performed many guerrilla actions against them. These battles, involving as many as 10,000 men, are rarely recorded officially in history. Most local CCP commanders simply ordered guerrilla attacks and ambushes as they saw fit, instead of waiting for direct orders from the central command.
Sources
- The Battle of One Hundred Regiments, from Kataoka, Tetsuya; Resistance and Revolution in China: The Communists and the Second United Front. Berkeley: University of California Press, [1974]. [1]
References
- ^ Peasant Nationalism and Communist Power: The Emergence of Revolutionary China 1937–1945; Johnson, Chalmers A. ; pg. 57.
External links
- Map of the 100 Regiments Offensive
- Map of the 100 Regiments Offensive and Japanese counter attacks with units ID
- Axis History Forum:100 Regiments Offensive discussion, maps
Dapyx Software network: MP3 Explorer | Ebook Manager | Zenithic