Japanese invasion of Manchuria

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Japanese invasion of Manchuria
Part of the interwar period
Japanese troops marching into Shenyang on September 18, 1931
Date September 18, 1931 – February 27, 1932 (5 months, 1 week and 2 days) Location Manchuria, China Result Japanese victory Tanggu Truce Territorial changes Manchuria seized by the Kwantung Army Establishment of Manchukuo as a Japanese puppet state
Belligerents
Japan  Manchukuo (from 1932) Chinese collaborators	China
Commanders and leaders
Senjuro Hayashi Puyi Zhang Haipeng	Zhang Xueliang Ma Zhanshan Feng Zhanhai Ding Chao
Strength
30,000–60,450 men[citation needed]	160,000 men

The

A minor dispute known as the

Believing that a conflict in Manchuria would be in the best interests of Japan, and acting in the spirit of the Japanese concept of gekokujō, Kwantung Army Colonel Seishirō Itagaki and Lieutenant Colonel Kanji Ishiwara independently devised a plan to provoke Japan into invading Manchuria by setting up a false flag incident for the pretext of invasion.

The operation was originally planned to be executed on 28 September, but the date was changed to September 18^{[citation needed]}. When 1st Lieutenant Suemori Komoto of the Independent Garrison Unit (独立守備隊) of the 29th Infantry Regiment (which guarded the South Manchuria Railway) placed explosives near the tracks, but far enough away to do no real damage. At around 10:20 pm (22:20) on September 18, the explosives were detonated. However, the explosion was minor and only a 1.5-meter section on one side of the rail was damaged. In fact, a train from Changchun passed by the site on this damaged track without difficulty and arrived at Shenyang at 10:30 pm (22:30).^[6]

On the morning of September 19, two artillery pieces installed at the Shenyang officers' club opened fire on the Chinese garrison nearby, in response to the alleged Chinese attack on the railway. Zhang Xueliang's small air force was destroyed, and his soldiers fled their destroyed Beidaying barracks, as five hundred Japanese troops attacked the Chinese garrison of around seven thousand. The Chinese troops were no match for the experienced Japanese troops. By the evening, the fighting was over, and the Japanese had occupied Shenyang at the cost of five hundred Chinese lives and only two Japanese lives, thus starting the greater invasion of Manchuria.

In early 1932 there was the January 28 incident 1932 in Shanghai, then in May 1932, the Japanese Prime Minister was assassinated (this reduced civilian oriented rule in Japan).

Initial annexation

On September 18, 1931, the Japanese Imperial General Headquarters, which had decided upon a policy of localizing the incident, communicated its decision to the Kwantung Army command. However, Kwantung Army commander-in-chief General Shigeru Honjō instead ordered his forces to proceed to expand operations all along the South Manchuria Railway. Under orders from Lieutenant General Jirō Tamon, troops of the 2nd Division moved up the rail line and captured virtually every city along its 1,170-kilometre (730-mile) length in a matter of days.

Likewise on September 19, in response to General Honjō's request, the Joseon army in

After the Liaoning Provincial government fled Mukden, it was replaced by a "Peoples Preservation Committee" which declared the secession of Liaoning province from the Republic of China. Other secessionist movements were organized in Japanese-occupied Kirin by General Xi Qia head of the Manchukuo Imperial Army, and at Harbin, by General Chang Ching-hui. In early October, at Taonan in northwest Liaoning province, General Zhang Haipeng declared his district independent of China, in return for a shipment of a large number of military supplies by the Japanese Army.

On October 13, Zhang Haipeng ordered three regiments of the Manchukuo Imperial Army under General Xu Jinglong north to take the capital of Heilongjiang province at Qiqihar. Some elements in the city offered to peacefully surrender the old walled town, and Chang advanced cautiously to accept. However his advance guard was attacked by General Dou Lianfang's troops, and in a savage fight with an engineering company defending the north bank, were sent fleeing with heavy losses. During this fight, the Nenjiang railroad bridge was dynamited by troops loyal to General Ma Zhanshan to prevent its use.

Resistance to the Japanese invasion

Using the repair of the Nen River Bridge as the pretext, the Japanese sent a repair party in early November under the protection of Japanese troops. Fighting erupted between the Japanese forces and troops loyal to the acting governor of Heilongjiang province Muslim General Ma Zhanshan, who chose to disobey the Kuomintang government's ban on further resistance to the Japanese invasion.

Despite his failure to hold the bridge, General Ma Zhanshan became a national hero in China for his resistance at Nenjiang Bridge, which was widely reported in the Chinese and international press. The publicity inspired more volunteers to enlist in the

The repaired bridge made possible the further advance of Japanese forces and their armored trains. Additional troops from Japan, notably the

On November 15, 1931, despite having lost more than 400 men and 300 left wounded since 5 November, General Ma declined a Japanese ultimatum to surrender Qiqihar. On 17 November, in subzero weather, 3,500 Japanese troops, under the command of Jirō Tamon, mounted an attack, forcing General Ma from Qiqihar by 19 November.

Operations in southern Northeast China

In late November 1931, General Honjō dispatched 10,000 soldiers in 13 armored trains, escorted by a squadron of bombers, in an advance on

With this stronger force, the Japanese Army announced on December 21, the beginning of large-scale anti-bandit operations in Manchuria to quell a growing resistance movement by the local Chinese population in Liaoning and Kirin provinces.

On December 28, a new government was formed in China after all members of the old Nanjing government resigned. This threw the military command into turmoil, and the Chinese army retreated to the south of the

With southern Manchuria secure, the Japanese turned north to complete the occupation of Manchuria. As negotiations with Generals Ma Zhanshan and Ding Chao to defect to the pro-Japanese side had failed, in early January Colonel Kenji Doihara requested collaborationist General Qia Xi to advance his forces and take Harbin.

The last major Chinese regular force in northern Manchuria was led by General Ding Chao who organized the defense of Harbin successfully against General Xi until the arrival of the Japanese 2nd Division under Jirō Tamon. Japanese forces took Harbin on February 4, 1932.

By the end of February Ma had sought terms and joined the newly formed Manchukuo government as governor of Heilongjiang province and Minister of War.

On February 27, 1932, Ding offered to cease hostilities, ending official Chinese resistance in Manchuria, although combat by guerrilla and irregular forces continued as Japan spent many years in their campaign to pacify Manchukuo.

Effect on Japanese homefront

The conquest of Manchuria, a land rich in natural resources, was widely seen as an economic "lifeline" to save Japan from the effects of the Great Depression, generating much public support.^[9] The American historian Louise Young described Japan from September 1931 to the spring of 1933 as gripped by "war fever" as the conquest of Manchuria proved to be an extremely popular war.^[10] The metaphor of a "lifeline" suggested that Manchuria was crucial to the functioning of the Japanese economy, which explains why the conquest of Manchuria was so popular and why afterwards Japanese public opinion was so hostile towards any suggestion of letting Manchuria go.^[11]

At the time, censorship in Japan was nowhere near as stringent as it later became, and Young noted: "Had they wished, it would have been possible in 1931 and 1932 for journalists and editors to express anti-war sentiments".

The Western media reported on the events with accounts of atrocities such as bombing civilians or firing upon shell-shocked survivors.[14] It aroused considerable antipathy to Japan, which lasted until the end of World War II.^[14]

When the

The Manchurian Crisis had a significant negative effect on the moral strength and influence of the League of Nations. As critics had predicted, the League was powerless if a strong nation decided to pursue an aggressive policy against other countries, allowing a country such as Japan to commit blatant aggression without serious consequences. Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini were also aware of this, and ultimately both followed Japan's example in aggression against their neighbors: in the case of Italy, against Abyssinia (1935–7); and Germany, against Czechoslovakia (1938–9) and Poland (1939).^[16]

See also

• Zhang Xueliang
  on 29 December 1928)
• Chiang Kai-shek
• Military of the Republic of China
• National Revolutionary Army
• Second Sino-Japanese War

References

Citations

Sources

• Thorne, Christopher. "Viscount Cecil, the Government and the Far Eastern Crisis of 1931." Historical Journal 14, no. 4 (1971): 805–26. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2638108 online].
• [1]^{[permanent dead link]}
• Sun, Fengyun. 《東北抗日聯軍鬥爭史》
• Coogan, Anthony (1994). Northeast China and the Origins of the Anti-Japanese United Front. Modern China, Vol. 20, No. 3 (July 1994), pp. 282-314: Sage Publications.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location (link)
• Matsusaka, Yoshihisa Tak (2003). The Making of Japanese Manchuria, 1904-1932. Harvard University Asia Center.
  ISBN 978-0-674-01206-6
  .
• Guo, Rugui (2005-07-01). Huang Yuzhang (ed.). 中国抗日战争正面战场作战记 [China's Anti-Japanese War Combat Operations]. Jiangsu People's Publishing House.
  ISBN 7-214-03034-9
  .
  • 中国抗日战争正面战场作战记 [China's Anti-Japanese War Combat Operations]. wehoo.net. Archived from the original on 2011-10-01.
    • 第二部分：从“九一八”事变到西安事变“九一八”事变和东北沦陷 ["9/18" Emergency and Northeast falls to the enemy]. wehoo.net. Archived from the original on 2011-07-24.
    • 第二部分：从“九一八”事变到西安事变事变爆发和辽宁 吉林的沦陷 [The emergency erupts with Liaoning, Jilin falling to the enemy]. wehoo.net. Archived from the original on 2007-05-27. Retrieved 2007-12-28.
    • "Wehoo.net" 第二部分：从“九一八”事变到西安事变江桥抗战和黑龙江省的失陷 [River bridge defense and Heilongjiang Province falls to the enemy]. wehoo.net. ^{[dead link]}
    • 第二部分：从“九一八”事变到西安事变锦州作战及其失陷 [The Jinzhou battle and its fall to the enemy]. wehoo.net. Archived from the original on 2019-11-10. Retrieved 2007-12-28.
    • 第二部分：从“九一八”事变到西安事变哈尔滨保卫战 [The defense of Harbin]. wehoo.net. Archived from the original on 2011-10-01.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Japanese invasion of Manchuria.

• "On The Eastern Front", April 1932, Popular Science photo collection of Invasion of Manchuria and Shanghai International Settlement During the Shanghai Incident
• "MANCHURIA - What This Is All About", February 1932, Popular Mechanics
• Solving the "Manchurian Problem": Uchida Yasuya and Japanese Foreign Affairs before the Second World War
• Japan's "Sole Road for Survival": The Range of Views Within the Guandong Army over the Seizure of Manchuria and Mongolia"
• International Military Tribunal for the Far East Japanese Aggression Against China
• Monograph 144, Manchurian Incident
• Mukden Incident & Manchukuo, WW2 database
• Manchuria 1931-1932 Photos from the Manchurian campaign
• AMS Topographic maps of Manchuria
• Japanese Invasion of Manchuria Photograph Collection