In that year, the battle of Yansu Cliff was called the "Battle of Annihilation at the Three Forks", and the battle of Loess Ridge was called the "Loess Ridge Siege Battle".
In the battle of Loess Ridge, the Japanese army finally broke through and did not fight a battle of annihilation like Yansu Cliff, and the troops participating in the battle were criticized afterwards. However, after learning that Lieutenant General Abe was killed, the plot was reversed instantly, the halo effect covered up the shortcomings, and the publicity momentum far exceeded that of Yansu Cliff.
The Eighth Route Army's attention to the Loess Ridge began with a telegram from Chiang Kai-shek.
On November 20, Chiang Kai-shek sent a telegram to **, the full text of which is as follows:
Commander-in-Chief Zhu: According to the enemy's Hao[19] broadcast: The enemy's Tsujimura troops attacked south of Laiyuan in western Hebei Province on the day of this month's Jiang [3], and fought fiercely with our 120th Division, and the enemy should be routed. [4] The Japanese enemy, Lieutenant General Abu, led his troops to come to the aid and recaptured our heavy encirclement, and Lieutenant General Abu was killed on the spot. The Chatsuji Village Brigade was indeed the first brigade of the Second Independent Mixed Brigade, and Lieutenant General Abu seemed to be the commander of the regiment. It is hoped that the officers and soldiers who will participate in the above battle will be investigated and reported in detail, so as to reward them. Zhongzheng. (Eighth Route Army Military and Political Magazine, No. 3, 1940).
In the telegram, "Hao", "Jiang", and "Zhi" are rhymes and days, which are the common ways to write telegrams.
At this point, Abe's death was learned by the Eighth Route Army.
On the 22nd, Okabe wrote in his diary:
The news of the death of Lieutenant General Abe was also announced at home and abroad. In order to prevent the enemy's morale from swaying the pro-Japanese Chinese people, the previous stage has not been publicly announced, and now that the brigade commander has taken up his post, there is no need to worry about the above-mentioned drawbacks. To this end, it was agreed with ** to make it public. ”
On the 24th, ** and others informed the ministries of the news of the death of Abe Norihide, and at the same time demanded that "Rong Zhen should find out who killed me and whether it was the Battle of Yinkeng [Fang], and report it to us." ”
On the 25th, Yan'an's "New China Daily" reported the news of the killing of Lieutenant General Abe and published a short commentary. On the same day, the Jinchaji "Anti-Enemy Daily" carried a report under the headline "Lieutenant General Abe of the enemy was killed."
At this time, the killing of the Japanese lieutenant general was widely concerned, which was the biggest highlight of the battle at Loess Ridge.
Two days later, on November 27, 1939, Chiang Kai-shek's telegram from the Jin-Cha-Ji "Anti-Enemy Daily" added the number of enemies destroyed.
The headline of the "Anti-Enemy Daily" reads: "The Eighth Route Army of the Military Region Kills the Enemy Lieutenant General Abe and Chairman Jiang Sends a Special Telegram Commendation." The full text is as follows:
The Military Region Headquarters of this newspaper sent a telegram from the headquarters of the Eighth Route Army, saying: Chairman Chiang ordered in a telegram on 20 July: According to the enemy's broadcast on 19 July, the enemy's troops from Tsuji Village attacked south of Laiyuan on 3 March and fought fiercely with our 1st and 2nd Divisions, and should defeat more than 500 enemy troops. On the 4th, the enemy's lieutenant general Abe personally led his troops to come to the rescue, but he was besieged again, and Abe was killed on the spot. The investigation of this enemy in Yinfang and Loess Ridge successively annihilated more than 1,000 people, and the killing of the enemy's Lieutenant General Abe shows that our officers and men have performed heroically, which is very gratifying. It is hoped that the officers and men who will participate in the battle will be carefully reported and rewarded with rewards. ”
Comparing the telegram quoted above, the "Anti-Enemy Daily" made two changes to Chiang Kai-shek's telegram.
The first is to "fight fiercely with our 120th division, and the enemy should be defeated" and change it to:
In a fierce battle with our 1st and 2nd Divisions, we should defeat more than 500 of the enemy."
The second is that "the Chatsuji Village Brigade is indeed the first brigade of the Second Independent Mixed Brigade, and Lieutenant General Abu seems to be the commander of the regiment
The investigation of this enemy in Yinfang and Loess Ridge successively annihilated more than 1,000 people, and the killing of the enemy's Lieutenant General Abe shows that our officers and men have performed heroically, which is very gratifying. ”
The "Anti-Enemy Newspaper" hereby proposes that more than 1,000 enemies were annihilated in the two battles of Yinfang (Yansu Cliff) and Loess Ridge.
Immediately afterwards, on November 29 and December 1, Lin Lang wrote a war report on November 10 in the "Anti-Enemy Daily": "The victory of Loess Ridge".
Lin Lang wrote: In the battle of Loess Ridge, our army captured two machine guns, more than 20 rifles, nearly 400 corpses were burned into a pile of ashes, and more than 200 wounded soldiers were taken away. More than 300 horses of cattle loaded with ammunition for supplies have been captured by our troops. ”
Nearly 400 corpses were burned to ashes" and "more than 200 wounded soldiers" should come from the people who participated in the burning of the corpses. No prisoners were captured in the battle of Loess Ridge, and only the people who participated in the corpse removal and burning could know the number of Japanese casualties.
It is difficult to say whether what the people said is accurate, and it cannot be ruled out that the number of deaths will be subconsciously magnified, but the number of wounded soldiers may be insufficient, because all the wounded soldiers may not be concentrated in the crematorium.
In addition, the cremation of the corpse was on the evening of the 7th, and the battle ** on the 8th was not included. With the addition of this piece, the Japanese army should be more than 600.
On 6 December, the 1st and 2nd Divisions reported to the headquarters that the Loess Ridge Combat Special Service Regiment had "captured one traitor and dozens of people." The people said that two senior officials were killed by me, and the officers and men wept bitterly, buried two cannons and three or four hundred rifle machine guns in the soil, and burned a lot of military supplies and dead bodies." (Guan Xiang Ying Zhou Shiti to *** Zuo Quandian, December 6, 1939)).
On December 8, ** reported to Chiang Kai-shek:
According to a telegram from Division Changlong and Commander Nie Rong Zhen Weichen: I would like to report on the battle process and the officers and men who killed the commander of the Second Mixed Brigade, Lieutenant General Abe, as follows: ......At noon, the enemy was surrounded in Shangzhuangzi, and I attacked the enemy under the heavy artillery fire of enemy planes, and the enemy suffered extremely heavy casualties, and the commander of the Abe Brigade should have been killed by me......."”
Micro refers to the 5th, and Chen refers to 7 9 o'clock.
In this telegram, the number of enemies destroyed was more than 1,000.
According to the telegram of the 1st and 2nd Divisions on 6 December, "6 or 700 enemy communists" and the "Summary of the Winter Anti-Sweeping Campaign of the Shanxi-Chahar-Hebei Military Region," the "more than 900 enemy **" in the Loess Ridge of Si Gezhuang were reported, or the report of the Eighth Route Army Headquarters, considering that it was a report to Chiang Kai-shek, it is not difficult to understand that the number of enemies destroyed has been enlarged.
On December 11, the North China edition of "Xinhua**" published Zuo Quan's article: "From the killing of Lieutenant General Abe to the siege of the Shanxi-Chahar-Hebei border area by the enemy this time", which reads:
Lieutenant General Abe Norihide and more than 500 of his men died near Shangzhuangzi. ”
This article was written before 5 December, and when it was written, no telegram had been received from the Shanxi-Chahar-Hebei Military Region and the 1st and 2nd Divisions, so Zuo Quan said that the death of more than 500 people at Abe and below should have come from other sources.
After the battle of Loess Ridge, the Japanese army came to retaliate, and the troops were frequently transferred to deal with it, and it was not stabilized until the end of the winter anti-sweeping campaign on December 8.
On 10 December, the Political Department of the 1st Sub-district issued a propaganda leaflet entitled "The 1st Sub-district Has Won Two Great Victories in the 40-Day Anti-Sweeping Campaign of the Military Region," which mentioned that in the battle of Loess Ridge, "more than 900 Japanese criminals were killed, and the enemy's lieutenant general also lost his life." ”
On December 14, the 1st Division's "Detailed Report on the Battle of the Loess Ridge at the Three Forks" and the "Combat Briefing on the Forty-Day Anti-Sweeping Campaign" were released.
The Battle Detail writes:
The Japanese army "more than 900 people in the Loess Ridge Sigezhuang" - this number is the sum of the results of the Loess Ridge battle and the resistance of the first regiment in the area of Sigozhuang two days ago.
The Combat Briefing reads:
According to the reports of the captured civilians in this battle, more than 800 of the enemy's 1,500,600 were killed by us, and the commander of the 2nd Mixed Brigade, Lieutenant General Abe, was also killed in this battle."
On January 31, 1940, the Shanxi-Chahar-Hebei Military Region's "Summary of the Winter Anti-Sweeping Campaign" also summed up the results of the resistance of the Loess Ridge and the previous regiment as "more than 900 enemy leaders", which was consistent with the "Battle Details" of the First Division.
Two days before the battle of Loess Ridge, the Japanese army fought in Shang** and Si Gezhuang, all of them were a regiment of troops, and the number of enemies destroyed in these two places was recorded in Chen Zhengxiang's diary
On the 6th, the enemy attacked the positions west of Si Gezhuang and Loess Ridge at about 8 o'clock with a crowd of 1,000 people, and I fought fiercely with the enemy with three battalions and two companies for the whole day, and the enemy had more than 100 people. ”
The total of more than 900 in the "Campaign Summary" of the Military Region and the "Detailed Report on Battles" of the First Subdivision is subtracted from the "more than 100 soldiers" of the first regiment who alone annihilated the enemy in the previous two days, and about 800 enemies were annihilated in Loess Ridge alone, which is completely consistent with the "Combat Briefing" of the First Division.
This figure should be more comprehensive than the "six or seven hundred enemy communists" reported by the 1st and 2nd Divisions. The data of the 1st and 2nd Divisions should be from the special service regiment, or they should be limited to the results of the battle near the Loess Ridge in the west, and do not include the number of enemies destroyed by the 1st regiment near Zhuangzi in the east.
As the original document for the study of the battle of Loess Ridge, the authority of the "Battle Details" of the 1st Division is beyond doubt, especially the various data.
This detailed report of the battle was included in the "Selected Military Writings of Yang Chengwu" and has since been made public.
But few people know that the editors have made some changes to the original "Battle Details", and the "Battle Details" in the "Military Anthology" is no longer the original text.
For example, the original title of the article was "Detailed Report on the Battle of Sanchakou and Loess Ridge", and "Selected Military Writings" was changed to "Detailed Report on the Battle of Yansu Cliff and Loess Ridge".
The original inscription was "Yang Chengwu, Gao Peng, Huang Shoufa", and the "Military Anthology" was changed to "Yang Chengwu".
In the original text, "After the battle at the Three Forks, the enemy was completely annihilated and lost the dignity of the imperial army, and we expected that the retaliatory actions of the embarrassed and angry enemy were inevitable", and the "Military Anthology" was changed to "After the battle of Yansu Cliff, we expected that the retaliatory actions of the Japanese army were inevitable." ”
And so on and so forth.
These changes are either for the convenience of posterity, or for some political considerations, and do not affect the presentation of facts, but the changes in the numbers are different and can lead to misinterpretation.
As in the original text: "In the battle of Loess Ridge, according to the confessions of the people brought by the captured enemy, the enemy had a total of 2 [1] thousand 5,600 and more than 800 dead and wounded. ”
Figure 16-1 Detailed Report on the Battle of Loess Ridge at the Third Fork of the First Division
The "Selected Military Documents" was changed to: "According to the Japanese army's civilian husband, in this battle, there were more than 1,500 Japanese soldiers, and more than 900 were killed and wounded", an increase of 100.
Original text: "The enemy **: more than 500 people were annihilated at the three forks, and more than 900 people were killed in the Loess Ridge Division. ”
Figure 16-2 Detailed Report on the Battle of Loess Ridge at the Three Forks of the First Division
"Selected Military Writings" was changed to: "Japanese Army**: Yansu Cliff Battle Annihilated More Than 500 Japanese Soldiers." More than 900 Japanese soldiers were killed and wounded in the battle of Loess Ridge. ”
In this way, the results of the resistance two days ago were merged into the Loess Ridge.
It is not groundless to say that there are more than 900 Japanese troops in Loess Ridge.
In 1940, the pamphlet of the First Division of the First Division entitled "The First Division in the Three Years of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression" had an article called "The Great Victory in the Anti-Sweeping Campaign in the Winter of 1939 -- The Battle of Annihilation at the Three Forks and the Siege of Loess Ridge", which read:
In the past few days, the enemy has reinforced the Loess Ridge twice in a row, with a total of more than 1,500 ......However, under the fierce artillery fire of our army in the siege on all sides, more than 900 people have been killed and wounded. ”
This is consistent with the leaflet of the Political Department of a sub-district of 10 December 1939 and should have been used for external propaganda.
This number was later used by many war histories as the number of enemies destroyed in the Loess Ridge battle, such as:
History of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression in the Shanxi-Chahar-Hebei Military Region (1986 edition): "The Battle of Loess Ridge ended with the annihilation of more than 900 Japanese troops, the killing of Japanese lieutenant general commander Abe Norihide, and the seizure of a large number of military supplies. ”
The Eighth Route Army (1987 edition): "More than 900 Japanese soldiers were killed and wounded in Loess Ridge. ”
The War History of the Chinese People's Liberation Army (1987 edition): "In this battle, I annihilated more than 900 enemies. ”
History of China's War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression (1994 edition): "The battle of Loess Ridge killed and wounded more than 900 Japanese soldiers. ”
In this way, the editors of "Selected Military Writings" (1997 edition) changed the number of people who annihilated more than 800 enemies in Loess Ridge to more than 900, perhaps in line with the traditional expression to avoid dissent.
The problem, however, is that these changes are not explained in the Selected Military Texts, and the reader is confused and mistakenly thinks that he has seen the original historical documents.
As a matter of fact, after the end of the winter counter-sweep, the "Battle Statistics" of the First Sub-district recorded in the column "Enemy's Consumption Situation" in the battles of Yansu Cliff and Loess Ridge respectively: "All the officers and men below the level of the enemy's [Tsuji] village were annihilated" and "Except for the commander of the enemy's Lieutenant General Abe's brigade who was killed by our artillery fire, more than half of the officers and men under his subordinates" did not fill in the figures of the enemy annihilated.
To sum up, there are 500 (Zuo Quan ("The First and Second Divisions Sent a Telegram to the Headquarters" ("The First and Second Divisions' "Battle Briefing", the "Battle Details" of the First Division, the "Summary of the Winter Anti-Sweeping Campaign" of the Military Region, and Chen Zhengxiang's Diary ("Selected Military Writings" and other "* To Chiang Kai-shek") and other theories.
Filter: remove a minimum value of 500 - the left right's statement cannot be corroborated, and the evidence is not standing.
Remove a maximum of 1000 - a report to Chiang Kai-shek or attach a political factor.
Remove another sub-low value - the data of the first and second divisions may be incomplete.
Remove another high value of more than 900 - this is the total number of enemies destroyed in Loess Ridge and the previous battles.
The rest is the "Battle Briefing" of the 1st Division, which annihilated more than 800 enemies in the Loess Ridge, which corroborates with the original "Battle Details" of the 1st Division and Chen Zhengxiang's diary, or can be accepted.