Early China, allies strat

[anarchyintheuk]

Tuchman's book on Stillwell is as close as I've gotten to reading a book on the China front.

[Barb]

Try this, a lot of interesting stuff there around:
http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/CBI/index.html

I am currently reading third part of the Stillwells command
One is wondering how the Chinese were able to survive the war

[anarchyintheuk]

Thanks.

[CMDRMCTOAST]

I like action in my wargame and fighting china only diverts a little bit of early up front resources, I cant
sit there and let all those forces do nothing but static defence, makes for a semi standard game..
The hard part is dealing a blow to russia, India and Oz while still maintaining a full scale pacific campaign,
You can build up all ya want in the pacific but when the green machine starts rollin you cant stop it and I would rather
have a few more divisions at my disposal in the pacific and no aircraft bombing me in the rear.
All out warfare thats what the troops are for..

[CMDRMCTOAST]

ORIGINAL: Barb

Try this, a lot of interesting stuff there around:
http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/CBI/index.html

I am currently reading third part of the Stillwells command
One is wondering how the Chinese were able to survive the war

Nice site..

[jackyo123]

ORIGINAL: stuman

Thanks to this thread I now forsee a bunch of my time over the next several months being spent studying the China front. I must admit that of the dozens and dozens of books I have read over the years regarding WW2 I have read not one was about China specifically..

Exactly. I know, almost 'too' well, what happened and what is 'expected' of me in the pacific. But in China? I've no idea ...

[stuman]

ORIGINAL: Barb

Try this, a lot of interesting stuff there around:
http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/CBI/index.html

I am currently reading third part of the Stillwells command
One is wondering how the Chinese were able to survive the war

Thanks, I will start on that this weekend [:)]

[Gary D]

Tuchman's book on Stillwell is as close as I've gotten to reading a book on the China front.

Reading this one at the moment and it is a very good book. Gen. Stillwell spent a lot of time in China prior to the war. Seems he wore out a lot more shoes walking around China than he wore out tires driving around China. He even supervised building "roads" in China prior to 1937. I somehow doubt he would agree with our current view of Chinese infrastructure compared to what he saw.

Reading this work I often wonder why the China campaign did not turn into WW1 style trench warfare. The bridges that did exist in China could not support most armor, which was repeatedly requested by CKS and continually refused by Marshall for this reason. I hope the answer is in the last couple hundred pages!

[sven6345789]

another link about the airwar

http://surfcity.kund.dalnet.se/sino-japanese.htm

[Chickenboy]

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

1. Chinese units in open terrain are toast. Move them. Now.

2. Chinese units even in decent terrain (like forest hexes) take tremendous losses. Move them unless you really need to guard/block/delay in a decent-terrain hex.

3. Chinese units near the coast can be cut-off and destroyed. I prefer to move them beginning turn one and get them back to my MLR. But it may also be useful to keep them behind Jap lines to threaten LOS and LOC. Choose your poison.

4. The only way the Chinese can stand is to get into base hexes and behind forts. The best chain of bases to form an MLR appears to be Nanning, Liuchow, Kweilin, Hengyang, Changsha, Chengtow, Nanyang, Chengchow, Loyang, Sian. If the Japs bust through Nanyang/Chengchow or Loyang, the Chinese MLR can be consolidated at Sian. If Changsha, Chengtow, Hengyang, or Kweilin fall, though, it appears that the Chinese will have to fall back and defend Chungking and Chengtu. Yikes!

5. Thus far I have been able to hold the MLR described above. In part this is due to big forts and in part because the Japanese have to be careful not to advance to far and get cut-off themselves. I *think* this line is tenable. At the very least I hope it will buy me enough time to allow Chinese troops and aircraft squadrons to train and to begin to bring in Western Allied aircraft squadrons.

6. Replace as many low quality Chinese leaders with better quality leaders.

Canorebel,

Good advice as always.

To continue to stick to the OP thoughts for the thread, I offer the following:

Japanese artillery 'cuts a new one' for the Chinese recipients. It's fierce. Consider opportunities to defend against unsupported IJA infantry and maximize those. I think built up areas behind a river hex that are heavily fortified would do you some good. Prompt an immediate shock attack versus a slow and steady buildup of deliberate attacks where the IJA can bring in artillery and even airpower.

Several posters in other threads have commented on the combination of IJA infantry with armored units set to 'reserve / pursuit' mode. If the Chinese forces rout from the infantry combat, the tanks will chew the **** out of the routed Chinese troops. As a 2x IJ PBEM player, I have implemented this approach with success in my games.

Moral being: don't fight in the open against a combined arms IJA force. You'lll get your head handed to you. As Canorebel pointed out, Chinese infantry should be skulking from hiding spot to hiding spot-forest, rough, mountains, urbanized terrain, etc.

[Jonathan Pollard]

A US government-sponsored documentary apparently from early 1944 which does not cover the gains the Japanese made in their 1944 offensive.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tOtVQ7cNWY

[Menser]

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

1. Chinese units in open terrain are toast. Move them. Now.

2. Chinese units even in decent terrain (like forest hexes) take tremendous losses. Move them unless you really need to guard/block/delay in a decent-terrain hex.

3. Chinese units near the coast can be cut-off and destroyed. I prefer to move them beginning turn one and get them back to my MLR. But it may also be useful to keep them behind Jap lines to threaten LOS and LOC. Choose your poison.

4. The only way the Chinese can stand is to get into base hexes and behind forts. The best chain of bases to form an MLR appears to be Nanning, Liuchow, Kweilin, Hengyang, Changsha, Chengtow, Nanyang, Chengchow, Loyang, Sian. If the Japs bust through Nanyang/Chengchow or Loyang, the Chinese MLR can be consolidated at Sian. If Changsha, Chengtow, Hengyang, or Kweilin fall, though, it appears that the Chinese will have to fall back and defend Chungking and Chengtu. Yikes!

5. Thus far I have been able to hold the MLR described above. In part this is due to big forts and in part because the Japanese have to be careful not to advance to far and get cut-off themselves. I *think* this line is tenable. At the very least I hope it will buy me enough time to allow Chinese troops and aircraft squadrons to train and to begin to bring in Western Allied aircraft squadrons.

6. Replace as many low quality Chinese leaders with better quality leaders.

I would add...

7. Almost all chinese units start with a high number of disabled squads and devices, any unit not in enemy contact and you are not moving (or engineer units not building forts or other facilities) should be put immediately on rest mode to "repair" them, then switched to training if needed (i.e of thier objective is at 100 and thier exp is below 45).

8. Turn off repair of all factories and resorces, especially near the central rail lines the japanese will run roughshod over, you will need that supply elswhere and each point of repair sucks up 1000 supply.

9. Use river crossings, rough(all types) and mountainous terrain to slow the japanese western advances once they run out of rail line to use.

[PaxMondo]

ORIGINAL: stuman

What I am a bit unclear on from a historical perspective is whether Jap. could not conquer more of China than it did, or chose not to conquer more.

It is a complex answer. First, you need to understand the socio-political nature of the Japan leadership at that time and why they were in China to begin with. To say they were there for resources ignores the context of the times.

Japan in the 30's was experiencing a throw-back to the fuedal days. Each general was styling himself more as a daimyo than a general as we would understand it. The imperial court was very much hostage to a group of generals and their interests.

What were those interests? Far ranging. Some wanted to claim land for themselves in China as there was none left in Japan. Literally fiefdoms. Some thought to conquer china as it was Japan's manifest destiny. Bottom line was, there was no consensus on China, but rather a large number of personal agendas that had some congruency for fighting in China.

When the USA put the oil embargo in place, things changed. The hithertofore separate groups became much more homogenized. Japan was staring at an industrial shutdown far worse than the USA projections. Unemployment rates of greater than 50%, lack of heating oil, etc. Something to make the early 30's in the USA look like a recession in comparison. These generals and their corporate backers could not allow this to happen. Thus, the SRA was born in a united self interest. This is why you hear that Yamamoto was against the war, but powerless to avoid. He was. There really was no alternative except to capitulate which went completely against the culture.

Was the USA right to embargo JAPAN over the genocide in China and so precipitate Japan's entry into the war? That's a value question, and I won't touch it. But it is very clear in hindsight that the embargo did trigger it and the USA really did not think it would. Inability to understand other cultures and attempting to apply USA culture to international decisions has been a "hallmark" of USA foreign policy since Teddy Roosevelt. That, by the way, is not a good thing. Oh well.

Now I will touch Mike's statements above that history proves Japan could not conquer China. The answer is both yes and no. With their socio-polictical status, the impetus that put them in conflict would never allow them to weld sufficient united effort to conquer China. However, absent this, Jap had both the technology and industry to do whatever she wanted assuming a national interest to do so. Flipping that around, the only reason JAP could do so was that the chinese socio-political situation with the warlords was so much worse that they could rarely keep agreement to help each other more than a few weeks. IF china had united under Mao in 1929 instad of 1949, they could have run Japan out of china at any time they wanted.

It is clear that the game allows the player to make a united Japan effort in China. Something that after PH easily could have happened. It didn't only because the controlling IJA thought the war was won by Jan 1, 1942. They were actually waiting for Roosevelt to propose settlement terms. kinda funny that. Goes to show that that JAPAN leadership of the time made the exact same mistake that the USA did with the embargo: applied JAPAN culture values to a USA decision and the result was completely opposite of what they thought would happen. It really took until Aug 7, 1942 before the IJA understood that the war was just starting, but 8 months had been wasted in many ways.

There is a lot of good reading on this. "Japanese Destroyer Captain" is a long time favorite. Written by one of the very best who actually survived the war. Captained the Shuguri at one time amoung many other ships.

[Jim D Burns]

ORIGINAL: stuman

What I am a bit unclear on from a historical perspective is whether Jap. could not conquer more of China than it did, or chose not to conquer more.

One of the biggest problems with the Chinese land war in game is it fails utterly to simulate the problems Japan faced in keeping its troops fed deep inside China. Japan basically had to garrison ever foot of any transportation route it used to supply its troops in the interior, so a large chunk of its army was not available for campaigns.

The Japanese player enjoys far too much combat power in game. There should probably be at a minimum a garrison regiment (brigade or division for large population areas) required to be in every single road or rail hex captured by the Japanese. Fail to garrison a hex and it should be immediately cut and unavailable for supply movement use.

Japan’s army far outclassed the Chinese and could take whatever it wanted given time and supplies, but it was already too small to properly hold on to what it had in its possession on Dec. 41. Launching further offensives into the interior of China would and did require a large influx of new units be brought in. But in game Japan can attack non-stop from day one because it doesn’t have to worry about the transportation net behind its army.

The designers should make every major road or rail hex in China a 0 (0) dot base and put a Japanese regimental sized garrison requirement at each. This includes hexes that are in Chinese hands as well, pushing deeper into China would simply magnify the problems they already faced along the coastal areas. That would simulate the true problems Japan faced in China.

Jim

Edit: I guess another way to handle it would be to create a bunch of guerilla units that reconstitute like regular Chinese units do. But instead of appearing in Chungking, have 1 unit assigned to reconstitute in each road or rail hex. That way Japan would have to keep a land unit in each hex to prevent guerillas reconstituting in the rear along the road/rail net.

[stuman]

I have started to do some research in this area just this weekend. I have a ways to go !

[treespider]

Required reading :

History of the Sino-Japanese War 1937-1945 compiled by Hsu Long-hsuen and Chang Ming-Kai ----- considered by many to be the 'bible' when it comes to the Chinese OOB.... the actual narrative is farsical at best.

The Sino-Japanese War 1937-1941 by Frank Dorn ----- a nice accompaniment for the first work as it presents an unvarnished account of the campaigns for the first 4 years.

United States Army in World War Two ----- the US Army "green" books...
- Stilwell's Mission to China
- Stilwell's Command Problems
- Time Runs Out in CBI

The Japanese Monograph series - prepared after the war by Japanese officers provides a japanese perspective of many campaigns, some records are more complete than others
-Japanese Monograph No 70, China Area Operations Record, July 1937 - November 1941
-Japanese Monograph No 71, Army Operations in China, December 1941 - December 1943
-Japanese Monograph No 72, Army Operations in China, January 1944 - August 1945
-Japanese Monograph No 76, Air Operations in the China Area July 1937-August 1945
-Japanese Monograph No 129, China Area Operations Record- Command of the China Expeditionary Army August 1943-August 1945
-Japanese Monograph No 178, North China Area Operations, July 1937-May 1941
-Japanese Monograph No 179, Central China Area Operations Record, 1937-1941

China's Bitter Victory edited by James C. Hsiung & Steven I. Levine ----- a collection of essays about China during the war

Lost Chance in China: The World War II Despatches of John S Service -----Service was a State Dept officer assigned to China from 1933-1945. This work is a collection of the reports he sent from China during the conflict

The Chinese Army 1937-49 by Phillip Jowett ----- the Osprey book on the Chinese Army has some decent nuggets of info as well...

Rays of the Rising Sun by Phillip Jowett ----- details the Chinese puppets

When Tigers Fight by Dick Wilson --- a generlised account of the conflict with some good anecdotal accounts of some of the fighting

Village China at war: the impact of resistance to Japan, 1937-1945 By Dagfinn Gatu

The Chinese People's Liberation Army by Samuel B Griffith II ----- a history of the communist army.

The Cambridge History of China,Volume 13, Republican China 1912-1949, Part 2 edited by Fairbank, John King, etal.

[wpurdom]

I fear it is a hopeless task to simulate the China front historically in a Pacific-oriented game.

1. Consider first that some things should be even harder in China for the Allied leadership. Most notably for the period of the Pacifac War until about the time of the Russian intervention, the Red Army and the Japanese have a de facto truce. This followed the Hundred Regiments offensive where the Red Army attacked and did the Japanese large damage and the Japanese counterattacked and devastated the best Red Army formations. The Red Army is busy building up an infratructure behind Japanese lines, but it is not actively engaging the Japanese. It is fighting the Nationalists more than the Japanese, largely behind Japanese front lines.
2. The Hundred regiments offensive was apparently launched by Red Army commanders against Mao's wishes, at a time when Chiang was afraid everything was about to fall apart politically and militarily.
3. After the Chinese defenses had time to solidify, the Japanese Army made an assessement like that suggested by Jim Burns - that they did not have the wherewithal to drive on and take Chungking without losing control of either their logistical support or large areas they were occupying - even when limited to consideration of the part of China controlled by the Nationalists. They did not think that lesser conquests would serve much purpose as long as the political support for resistance remained, and they thought that political support was propped up by Western and Soviet support for Chiang.
4. As for whether they were right, who knows. It's sorta like the Germans had gone on the defensive, except for limited punishing counterattacks after the winter of 1941-42. (Let's say they smash the Kharkov offensive and stop). We would be in a poor position to judge whether they were right or wrong.
5. Some specifics that are wrong IMHO on the China front, but don't address many fundamental issues:
a. Allies being able to use the Red Army without a Japanese attack on it.
b. Offensive use of artillery to wear down Chinese forces outside of fixed defenses, like cities. (See next for distinction between light contact and hold fast).
c. Lack of Chinese option to break contact at low cost in the countryside and retreat - they should have a hold fast and light contact option on defend. Perhaps one could have special rules for combat with units in reserve, with putting all your forces in reserve being a sensible light contact option, so that the artilley can't get them and the caualties before retreat being minimized.
d. Chinese infantry are overvalued in victory points - their value should be minimal, perhaps a fifth.
e. Chinese infantry units should be able to reconstitute on any unoccupied hex with a Chinese controlled hexside. They should be able to send small infantry units to continually break supply lines and be able to afford it in victory points. And if occupation forces get too low they should be able to form in surrounding unoccupied hexes, even if all hex sides are Jap controlled.

But making the China front work would be a whole game within a game requiring the work-up of a separate release.

[treespider]

ORIGINAL: wpurdom

I fear it is a hopeless task to simulate the China front historically in a Pacific-oriented game.

1. Consider first that some things should be even harder in China for the Allied leadership. Most notably for the period of the Pacifac War until about the time of the Russian intervention, the Red Army and the Japanese have a de facto truce. This followed the Hundred Regiments offensive where the Red Army attacked and did the Japanese large damage and the Japanese counterattacked and devastated the best Red Army formations. The Red Army is busy building up an infratructure behind Japanese lines, but it is not actively engaging the Japanese. It is fighting the Nationalists more than the Japanese, largely behind Japanese front lines.

Except for the fact that Communist guerillas continued to harass the Japanese throughout the war...ref the works of Ford and Service...and little nuggets from the Monographs. I forgot to add a nice little recent work entitled Village China at War.

2. The Hundred regiments offensive was apparently launched by Red Army commanders against Mao's wishes, at a time when Chiang was afraid everything was about to fall apart politically and militarily.
3. After the Chinese defenses had time to solidify, the Japanese Army made an assessement like that suggested by Jim Burns - that they did not have the wherewithal to drive on and take Chungking without losing control of either their logistical support or large areas they were occupying - even when limited to consideration of the part of China controlled by the Nationalists. They did not think that lesser conquests would serve much purpose as long as the political support for resistance remained, and they thought that political support was propped up by Western and Soviet support for Chiang.

Except as noted in Monograph No 71 pp 121-125 in early 1942 after it was seen that the occupation of the SRA was proceeding satisfactorily Imperial General Headquarters began planning for and implementing preparations for the coup de grace' on China. It was anticipated that the subjugation of Szechwan province would begin early in 1943. Not until September 21, 1942 after things in the Solomons began to turn for the worse was a decision made to postpone the Szechwan Operation.

4. As for whether they were right, who knows. It's sorta like the Germans had gone on the defensive, except for limited punishing counterattacks after the winter of 1941-42. (Let's say they smash the Kharkov offensive and stop). We would be in a poor position to judge whether they were right or wrong.
5. Some specifics that are wrong IMHO on the China front, but don't address many fundamental issues:
a. Allies being able to use the Red Army without a Japanese attack on it.
b. Offensive use of artillery to wear down Chinese forces outside of fixed defenses, like cities. (See next for distinction between light contact and hold fast).
c. Lack of Chinese option to break contact at low cost in the countryside and retreat - they should have a hold fast and light contact option on defend. Perhaps one could have special rules for combat with units in reserve, with putting all your forces in reserve being a sensible light contact option, so that the artilley can't get them and the caualties before retreat being minimized.

You can already place units in reserve and they are unaffected by the artillery...but you run the risk of being retreated out of the hex.

d. Chinese infantry are overvalued in victory points - their value should be minimal, perhaps a fifth.
e. Chinese infantry units should be able to reconstitute on any unoccupied hex with a Chinese controlled hexside. They should be able to send small infantry units to continually break supply lines and be able to afford it in victory points. And if occupation forces get too low they should be able to form in surrounding unoccupied hexes, even if all hex sides are Jap controlled.

You can already subdivide the existing "small" corps into three sub sections and send them hither and yon...and when eliminted they reappear in Chungking stronger than what they started.

But making the China front work would be a whole game within a game requiring the work-up of a separate release.

[Smeulders]

ORIGINAL: treespider

You can already subdivide the existing "small" corps into three sub sections and send them hither and yon...and when eliminted they reappear in Chungking stronger than what they started.

One problem with this though, if you try to break up a unit that is already very small, one or two of the parts will immediately be 'destroyed' and they aren't coming back.

[wpurdom]

quote:

4. As for whether they were right, who knows. It's sorta like the Germans had gone on the defensive, except for limited punishing counterattacks after the winter of 1941-42. (Let's say they smash the Kharkov offensive and stop). We would be in a poor position to judge whether they were right or wrong.
5. Some specifics that are wrong IMHO on the China front, but don't address many fundamental issues:
a. Allies being able to use the Red Army without a Japanese attack on it.
b. Offensive use of artillery to wear down Chinese forces outside of fixed defenses, like cities. (See next for distinction between light contact and hold fast).
c. Lack of Chinese option to break contact at low cost in the countryside and retreat - they should have a hold fast and light contact option on defend. Perhaps one could have special rules for combat with units in reserve, with putting all your forces in reserve being a sensible light contact option, so that the artilley can't get them and the caualties before retreat being minimized.

You can already place units in reserve and they are unaffected by the artillery...but you run the risk of being retreated out of the hex.

But do you take light casualties and limited morale drops from the resulting attack and the armor follow-up? I get the impression not, but don't really know. If the casualties are light under those circumstances, my apologies.

To judge what the war should be like in 1942, we need to look at the repulse of the Chinese offensive towards Canton and the counter-repulse of the Japanese counter-attack towards Changsha. I have no idea of how accurate the Wikipedia account is, but its hard to see something like this happening in AE

The third Battle of Changsha (December 24, 1941 – January 15, 1942) was the first major offensive in China by Imperial Japanese forces following the Japanese attack on the Western Allies.

The offensive was originally intended to prevent Chinese forces from reinforcing the British Commonwealth forces engaged in Hong Kong. With the capture of Hong Kong on December 25, however, it was decided to continue the offensive against Changsha in order to maximize the blow against the Chinese government.[1]

The offensive resulted in failure for the Japanese, as Chinese forces were able to lure them into a trap and encircle them. After suffering heavy casualties, Japanese forces called for a general retreat.[1]

Course of battle
On December 27, the Japanese 3rd, 6th, and 40th Divisions massed at Yueyang and advanced southward in three columns and crossed the Sinchiang River, and tried again to cross the Milo River to reach Changsha. However, the Chinese formed a deep pocket around the city and set up ambush parties around the Luoyang River. Halfway from Milo River and Changsha, the Japanese columns faced strong resistance from the Chinese and the eastern column was forced to take a detour further east, and the other two columns had to move closer together than originally planned. During the southward advance the Japanese encountered three Chinese army divisions that were pushed aside but not crushed; they retreated into the eastern mountains.

Changsha was evacuated except for the Chinese army and some 160 civilians who wished to stay to help the defense. On December 31, the Japanese troops stormed the southeastern defense of the city but failed to make any gains, and then made an attempt at the southern and then eastern part of the defense. Meanwhile, the northern part of the city was heavily bombarded. The Japanese eventually cut through the first line of defense, only to meet stubborn resistance from a second line of defense near the city center.

On January 1, the Chinese quickly counter-attacked and surprised the Japanese with heavy guns and inflicted heavy casualties on them. At about the same time, the previous army units that had retreated to the mountains swept down to attack the Japanese supply lines, with plenty of aid from local guerillas. The Japanese line collapsed on January 4. The three Japanese divisions were besieged and requested the help of the Japanese 9th Independent Brigade stationed in Yueyang. However, on January 9 they faced heavy fighting with the Chinese and were unable to relieve the besieged Japanese divisions. The Japanese then attempted to retreat through the Luoyang River, not knowing that an ambush party was already stationed in the region. Losing heavily at the river crossing, the Japanese eventually reached the Sinchiang River on January 15 to complete the retreat.

And the 1942 repulse followed a repulse in 1939 of a similar Japanese offensive.