noffsinger Chapter 744: The Fall of Changsha
Chapter 744: The Fall of Changsha
As a result, the Fourth Army of the Chinese Government made improper defensive deployment in Changsha City, resulting in the Fourth Army of the Chinese Government only defending Changsha City for three days before this city, which had never fallen during the War of Resistance, was occupied by the offensive forces of the Eleventh Army of the Japanese Army.
Sure enough, just as Chief of Staff Zhao Zili of the Ninth War Zone of the Chinese Government worried, before attacking Changsha this time, Lieutenant General Isamu Yokoyama, commander of the 11th Army of the Japanese Army, learned from the disastrous defeat in the Third Battle of Changsha. When formulating the combat plan before the war, Lieutenant General Isamu Yokoyama, commander of the 11th Army of the Japanese Army, asked the offensive forces of the 11th Army of the Japanese Army not to directly attack Changsha City after encircling Changsha City, but to first gather troops to attack Yuelu Mountain.
After the attacking force of the 11th Japanese Army surrounded Changsha, it concentrated its forces and launched a fierce attack on Yuelu Mountain in accordance with the combat plan. This change of direction by the 11th Japanese Army also caught the 90th Division of the 4th Army of the Chinese government off guard.
As a result, the 90th Division was already unable to hold on after only one day of attacking the defensive positions on Yuelu Mountain by the offensive forces of the Japanese 11th Army. At the same time, after losing the artillery support of the artillery brigade on Yuelu Mountain, the positions of the defensive forces responsible for Changsha City were repeatedly broken through by the offensive forces of the Japanese 11th Army.
Commander Zhang of the Fourth Army of the Huaxia Government finally realized that the opinions previously raised by Chief of Staff Zhao Zili of the Ninth War Zone of the Huaxia Government were correct. So, Commander Zhang of the Fourth Army quickly dispatched a division of troops to cross the Xiangjiang River to rescue Yuelu Mountain.
However, due to confusion in command, the division that Commander Zhang of the Fourth Army had withdrawn to reinforce Yuelu Mountain was thought to have seen that the defensive positions on Yuelu Mountain could no longer hold out and wanted the troops to retreat, so this division actually left the battlefield and retreated.
After losing its support, Yuelu Mountain was finally occupied by the offensive forces of the Japanese 11th Army. Commander Zhang of the 4th Army, who was responsible for the defense of Changsha City, had to lead his troops to withdraw from Changsha.
After learning about the true scale of the Japanese 11th Army's offensive force, Commander Xue of the Chinese government's 9th War Zone knew that the fall of Changsha was only a matter of time, because the Chinese government's 9th War Zone's battle plan to have a decisive battle with the Japanese 11th Army's offensive force outside Changsha had failed. Now no matter which army came to defend the city, it could only delay the speed of the Japanese 11th Army's offensive force advancing southward, and it would be impossible to completely repel the Japanese 11th Army's offensive force as in the previous Changsha battles.
It was precisely because of this that Commander Xue of the Ninth War Zone of the Chinese Government led the Ninth War Command of the Chinese Government to withdraw to Leiyang in southeastern Hunan before the Battle of Changsha began. However, Zhang Deneng, commander of the Fourth Army of the Chinese Government who was responsible for guarding the city of Changsha, was not so lucky.
Since the Fourth Army of the Huaxia government lost Changsha City in just three days, Zhang Deneng, the army commander, was taken to the mountain city for military trial. He was found guilty in the subsequent trial and was directly shot.
The troops of the Ninth War Zone of the Chinese Government fought very poorly in the Fourth Changsha Defense Battle. Overall, after Commander Xue of the Ninth War Zone of the Chinese Government failed to successfully continue to replicate the "Tianlu Tactics", the fall of Changsha was certain.
However, the Fourth Army of the Chinese government should not have suffered such a shameful defeat. It was said that it had fought with the attacking forces of the 11th Army of the Japanese Army for three days, but in fact the actual fighting time with the attacking forces of the 11th Army of the Japanese Army was less than 48 hours.
The city of Changsha, which had held out for more than six years, was finally captured by the attacking forces of the Japanese 11th Army. Even if the 4th Army could hold out in Changsha for a week and then break out, it would give the 10th Army of the Chinese government in Hengyang more time to prepare.
On June 16, 1944, Lieutenant General Isamu Yokoyama, commander of the 11th Army of the Japanese Army, issued the next offensive order to the participating divisions before Changsha was occupied by the offensive forces of the 11th Army of the Japanese Army.
Lieutenant General Isamu Yokoyama, commander of the 11th Army of the Japanese Army, also saw that the attack of his 11th Army had plunged the Chinese army of the Ninth War Zone of the Chinese Government into chaos. Therefore, he ordered the divisions of the 11th Army of the Japanese Army participating in the battle not to rest and prepare to quickly attack southward and seize Hengyang while the troops of the Ninth War Zone of the Chinese Government had not yet organized a new defense system in Hengyang.
According to the battle plan of the second phase of the Hunan-Guangxi Campaign in the previous "Operation No. 1" plan, the 68th Division and the 116th Division of the Japanese Army in the central attack force of the Japanese 11th Army had not participated in the offensive against Changsha before. Therefore, this time the troops of these two divisions will be responsible for the task of attacking and occupying Hengyang.
The Japanese 3rd Division and the Japanese 13th Division on the left wing of the Japanese 11th Army set out from Liuyang and attacked southward in the direction of Liling and Pingxiang, responsible for protecting the safety of the left wing of the Japanese 68th Division and the 116th Division attacking from the center. After capturing Ningxiang, the Japanese 40th Division continued to move south to Xiangxiang and sent a part of its troops to assist in the attack from the center.
After Changsha City was occupied by the offensive forces of the Japanese 11th Army, after two days of research, on June 20, the Military Commission of the Chinese Government decided to defend Hengyang to the death and prevent the offensive forces of the Japanese 11th Army from further advancing. At the same time, the Chinese troops on both wings of the Japanese 11th Army attacked northward to cut off the rear supply channels of the offensive forces of the Japanese 11th Army.
On June 72, the Military Commission of the Chinese Government issued a combat order to the Ninth War Zone Command of the Chinese Government, ordering the th, th, and nd Armies of the th Army Group of the Chinese Government, and the th and th Armies of the th Army Group to defeat the two left-wing divisions of the Japanese th Army in the direction of Liling.
The order was to use the 37th Army, the Provisional 2nd Army and the 3rd Division to defend Hengshan, part of the 24th Army to defend Xiangxiang, and the main force to attack the rear of the Japanese 11th Army's attacking forces in Miluo River to cut off the retreat of the Japanese 11th Army's attacking forces. The 10th Army of the Chinese Government and the Provisional 54th Division were responsible for guarding Hengyang.
Lieutenant General Isamu Yokoyama, commander of the 11th Japanese Army, had learned through aerial reconnaissance by Japanese aircraft that the Chinese government's 9th War Zone had concentrated heavy troops on the eastern and western fronts. Therefore, Lieutenant General Isamu Yokoyama, commander of the 11th Japanese Army, also gathered his forces heading south to the area where the Chinese government's 9th War Zone troops were located, preparing to take this opportunity to annihilate the main forces of the Chinese government's 9th War Zone.