ORIGINAL: bklooste
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_ ... note_China
3 studies show 3-4M dead.
The offical account of the war
published in Taiwan reported the Nationalist Chinese Army lost 3,238,000 men ( 1.797,000 WIA; 1,320,000 KIA and 120,000 MIA.) and 5,787,352 civilians in casualties. Personally i think these are about as reliable as the USSRs 1945 figures ie not very considering the MIA is 1/2 the KIA.
An academic study published in the United States estimates total war deaths of 15-20 million from all causes: military casualties: 1.5 million killed in battle, 750,000 missing in action, 1.5 million deaths due to disease and 3 million wounded;
Thats 3.7M military death (KIA ,MIA and disease) and a total of 6.7M Casualties. There is also reports of 3M militia/conscripts dead . I may be out but not by a major margin. The Major battles in terms of numbers occured later in the war ie the 1942 Battle of Changsha and the 44-45 battles. Even if you change it to 1/4 of the losses for 1941-45 it only halves it. SO if you take it as casualties your still looking at
200 squads per day of which half would be killed.
First things first. Never quote Wiki as source for anything if you wish to be taken seriously. It’s unreliable and changes constantly as people add and remove from it all the time. We even had a proven case once in the old WitP forums where a poster went and modded wiki to back up some assertions he was making in a topic of discussion.
That said the numbers you cite back up the fact there were 1.3 million dead. You can’t then go and pile on those lost from disease and wounds and try and say they should be part of the casualties caused in combats.
Disease was a big part of every armies total war casualties, but the game does not model that kind of attrition and it is wrong to try and count them when analyzing game numbers. We have killed and disabled. Killed is killed, simple enough. Disabled is missing and wounded, or damaged vehicles and equipment that can be recovered over time.
Attrition figures are “sort of” modeled in the fatigue and morale numbers, but there are no permanent losses in game that would account for them.
As to Changsha 44 being one of the major battles of the war, I agree. But in terms of numbers lost (100,000 Chinese), it doesn’t even come close to the second battle of Shanghai (or many other early battles) where China lost 250,000 of the 700,000 that defended the city, Japan lost 40,000 out of the 300,000 involved in the attack.
http://ww2db.com/battle_spec.php?battle_id=144
http://ww2db.com/battle_spec.php?battle_id=85
The numbers cited for Changsha 44 are actually the total for the entire Operation Ichi Go, which encompassed an entire 17 division offensive that would be fought across half of southern China. In terms of scale, casualties after 1941 were nowhere near as bad as what had happened in the first five years of the Sino-Japanese War. China had learned to fight and their troops for the most part preformed far better than in the early years.
But the most important thing to note from the Shanghai battle is the fact the battle lasted from Aug. 37 to Nov. 37. It took 3 months to reduce this large body of Chinese troops to a point where they could be overcome. THAT is the true weakness of the current system in game. Currently Shanghai would take days or weeks to reduce and Japan would have minimal losses and would be able to move to the next objective immediately.
Jim
