Why could Japan never penetrate Chungking (Chongqing)?

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zstar
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Why could Japan never penetrate Chungking (Chongqing)?

#1

Post by zstar » 05 Mar 2005, 03:55

Why is it that they could never make it that far into China?
Is it because they couldn't be bothered or it was too hard and full of obstacles and fierce resistance?
I know they bombed the city many times but what prevented them from being able to deploy their fround forces into the wartime capital? After all they did have 8 years to do it.

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#2

Post by Goldfish » 05 Mar 2005, 16:56

They planned a final assault on Chungking, codenamed GO-GO (a very funny name by the way), scheduled for summer 1942, but only the opening phases were launched. It was designed to take advantage of the cutting of the Burma Road and presupposed that the Pacific would be quiet and the Chinese demoralized by American and British defeats. The operation was cancelled following the series of Allied successes at Midway, Guadalcanal, and New Guinea when the Japanese Army realized they might need to draw on China for manpower and combat aircraft in the Pacific.

Chungking was not all that far from Japan's main base in central China at Hankow, but the main reason I think a direct assault was not launched was because a direct assault up the Yangtze would expose their flank to Communist forces (which had shown their teeth in the "Hundred Regiments" campaign earlier in the war) as well as the large (around 500,000 men) Nationalist force blockading the Communists. Also they would be exposing their flank to largely unconquered south China. In other words, the Yangtze was a bottleneck that the Japanese would probably never have assaulted unless they were sure Chiang was ripe to fall.

The real question was why they never gave serious consideration to assaulting Yunnan and destroying the "Hump" airfields there. Imagine if they had used the troops for Imphal/Kohima to attack Yunnan in coordination with ICHIGO. A frightening thought.


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#3

Post by Major Major » 06 Mar 2005, 05:12

Thank you for this information.
I am working on an alternate-history novel that involves, among other things, a Japanese offensive in China in late 1942, and this fits very well.

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#4

Post by zstar » 06 Mar 2005, 15:21

Goldfish wrote:They planned a final assault on Chungking, codenamed GO-GO (a very funny name by the way), scheduled for summer 1942, but only the opening phases were launched. It was designed to take advantage of the cutting of the Burma Road and presupposed that the Pacific would be quiet and the Chinese demoralized by American and British defeats. The operation was cancelled following the series of Allied successes at Midway, Guadalcanal, and New Guinea when the Japanese Army realized they might need to draw on China for manpower and combat aircraft in the Pacific.

Chungking was not all that far from Japan's main base in central China at Hankow, but the main reason I think a direct assault was not launched was because a direct assault up the Yangtze would expose their flank to Communist forces (which had shown their teeth in the "Hundred Regiments" campaign earlier in the war) as well as the large (around 500,000 men) Nationalist force blockading the Communists. Also they would be exposing their flank to largely unconquered south China. In other words, the Yangtze was a bottleneck that the Japanese would probably never have assaulted unless they were sure Chiang was ripe to fall.

The real question was why they never gave serious consideration to assaulting Yunnan and destroying the "Hump" airfields there. Imagine if they had used the troops for Imphal/Kohima to attack Yunnan in coordination with ICHIGO. A frightening thought.

Maybe the airfields were protected very well.
After all the hump was China's lifeline and i can imagine it being well protected from Japanese bombardment and attacks.

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#5

Post by Goldfish » 08 Mar 2005, 15:11

The Chinese defenders in Yunnan were better than those in front of ICHIGO, thanks to the Y-Force training program, but still only about twenty divisions, most of them tied down on the Salween or warlord troops (under the command of Yunnan warlord Long Yun). Long Yun's troops were French-equipped, but never tested in battle and of dubious loyalty to Chiang's regime. It should also be considered that the Chinese had no plan for defending the Yunnan airfields in the event of a Japanese invasion. In late 1944, as the Japanese moved on Nanning and the road to Kunming seemed open, Chiang ignored the advice of General Wedemeyer to defend the Yunnan frontier and ordered his forces in Yunnan to fall back on Kunming and turn it into a fortress. Advised that this meant abandoning the Hump airfields to the Japanese, Chiang refused to reconsider. As it was, the Japanese never crossed into Yunnan from Nanning, but it shows what could have been achieved had they done so. The Fourteenth Air Force would have fought fiercely for its airfields, but wth Hump transports full of the desperate supplies for the ground troops that Chiang surely would have demanded instead of fuel, bombs, and bullets for Chennault's fliers, their effectiveness would be limited.

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#6

Post by mars » 08 Mar 2005, 20:33

Goldfish, Long yun's troops were committed into the battle since beginning of the Sino-Japanese war, and those troops kept thier loyal to chiang even after Long himself was sacked by chiang in 1946

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#7

Post by Goldfish » 09 Mar 2005, 13:00

I mean Long Yun's private army. The French-trained and equipped units that were personally loyal to Long Yun, not the Central Government units attached to Y-Force that were officially under Long Yun's command (as War Area Commander) but actually answered to the National Military Council. Long Yun's units fought against the central government units in October 1945 when Chiang cracked down on the last warlords and disbanded their private armies. Like the other warlord troops, some were conscripted into (or joined) the Nationalist Army, but most became bandits or joined the Communists.

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#8

Post by mars » 09 Mar 2005, 18:33

Goldfish, when the sino-Japanese war broke out, Long Yun had one army corps: the 60th army corps, french-trained and armed with frend weapon, 60th army corps was sent to Jiang su province in 1938 and took parted in the battle of Tai er Zhuang, in which chinese defeated 2 divisions of Japanes and inflicted more than 10000 casualities, later the 60th army corps also battled Japanese in Hu Bei and Hu Nan province, later in the war , Long Yun's army was expanded to 2 army Corps: the 60th and 93nd, both of those 2 Corps were committed into the second battle of Burma between 1944-1945, and they were start arming with US provided weapon, Long Yun did not have other regular troops except some local militia, at the same time there were around 200,000 troops directly controlled by central government in the Yun-Nan province, so Long Yun's loyalty was not a serious concern.
After Long was dismissed, 60th and 93nd army corps was NOT disbanded, both of these 2 corps were sent to North-eastern of china to fight the civil war, both of them,especially the 60th army corps, performed very good in the civil war, only in 1948, the 93nd army corps was destroyed in the battle of Jin Zhou, and the 60th army corps was under siege in Chang Chun for months, under that hopless situation, 60th army corps had no other choice but surrendered under a terms that they would not be disbanded and joined the PLA, so the 60th army corps became the 50th army corps of PLA, and later they fought bravely against Americans in the Korea war,.

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#9

Post by Goldfish » 12 Mar 2005, 07:01

Thanks, I was confusing Long Yun's French-trained troops with his local militia. Also, my information shows that the 93rd Army was a part of the XI Group Army (which fought on the Salween) but was located first in Sichuan and later became part of the Z-Force training near Guilin. The 93rd then fought the Japanese approaching Guilin during ICHIGO. The 60th was part of the "Yunnan-Indochina Force" (consisting of the IX and I Group Armies) under Long Yun's command and assigned to defend the Yunnan-Indochina border and did not fight on the Salween.

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#10

Post by Simon Gunson » 18 Apr 2005, 11:14

Goldfish I think the simple answer is you need to go there and take a look at the awsome terrain.

Steep mountains, transected by deep ravines which could swallow huge armies.

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#11

Post by Goldfish » 18 Apr 2005, 13:20

Actually, I have been there, from Longling and Tengchong to Kunming. It is indeed imposing terrain, made even more so by rain and a bus driver who seemed to think that a pot of gold was waiting for him in the next town. Consider, however, that the Japanese were often capable of overcoming even the most formidable terrain (like that from the Chindwin to the Imphal plain) and they would have had the Burma Road as a supply line back to Rangoon. It would have been tough in the face of a stiff defense, but not impossible.

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#12

Post by Simon Gunson » 18 Apr 2005, 22:43

Sorry Goldfish. I did not mean to sound rude. It is good to hear that you have visited the place. Although it was not impossible it may well have been impracticable for the resources available to Japan to attempt an overland attack.

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#13

Post by Goldfish » 19 Apr 2005, 12:11

No offense taken. I agree that it would have been difficult and in the face of determined, organized, and well-supplied resistance, it could even have been a disaster. However, as I mentioned, the Japanese hadn't let that stop them from marching on Imphal. The Chinese in Yunnan were largely dependent on air supply from India or limited supply over the tortuous roads from Chongqing and elsewhere, placing the Japanese closer to a reliable source of supply (Rangoon) than the Chinese. Had the Hump been disrupted at the same time, the Chinese would probably have been more supply-starved than their Japanese counterparts.

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#14

Post by Simon Gunson » 20 Apr 2005, 11:06

Wouldn't it have been easier terrain to attack from the north (from Xian to Chengdu) ?
I say this because there is a railway line along this route and the terrain seems easier.

Who controlled Xian at the time ?

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#15

Post by Goldfish » 24 Apr 2005, 04:51

Xi'an, prior to Marco Polo Bridge, was the main base for the Guomindang's planned attack on the Communist base at Yan'an (further north in the same province). During the war, the Guomindang kept a large force of some of their best, most loyal troops there to contain the Communists. The Japanese could have forced their way through (although the terrain there is still pretty rough) and then turned south for Chengdu and Chongqing, but they would have then had a large Nationalist force on their left flank (the forces at Ichang, blocking an advance straight up the Yangtze) and a large Communist force on their right flank (the forces defending Yan'an and the Yellow River). They would have needed a lot of flank security or would have risked being cut off. Yunnan was still a better bet, in my opinion.

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