Memorandum to the Imperial General staff
On the amount of troops needed for initial operations
On the amount of troops needed for initial operations
Our first decision is do we defend the border against the Soviets?
It is my clear opinion that if we leave the border empty there will be border incidents where the Soviets will test our will to defend us selves and our subjects.
The strength of the Enemy has ebbs and tides, but seems to be around 1 division per bordering province on average, with a mix of unit types and support. Which means we can't do with significant less or we risk provoking an attack, so we need around 28 divisions here. The Manchurian troops are too unstable to be counted in this and moves around as if it was random.
Also the main land region boast 6 harbours requiring an additional 6 Garrison divisions.
Forces present in the theatre in total
42 Infantry Brigades - 51
18 Artillery Regiments - 12
22 Armoured Car Squadrons - 12
8 Engineer Companies - 3
18 Garrisons - 18
2 Infantry Tanks - 2
1 Light Armour - 1
1 Motorised - 1
13 Cavalry Squadrons - 13
To be build
6 AT - 6
Taken from other places.
4 Mot - 4
Where not mentioned otherwise
Gar - 2 x gar (potential reinforcement art later)
Cav - 2 x cav + AC
InfA - 2 x inf + art
InfT - 2 x inf + later AT
InfE - 3 x inf + Eng
Defensive deployment:
Chosen Gun (Korea)
4 Garx2 for harbours
1 Garx2+art for Soviet border
20 Homengun, just north of the border the facing the Vladivostok Front, with from the south up along the border up to the lake.
Gar,
19, 20 Hoheishidan (our only 5 brigade units 4xInf + AC/Art, which we shouldn't split)
InfT, InfA
6 Homengun, just North of the lake to the river Sungari
InfA, InfT, InfA, InfE, InfT
5 Homengun, from the river to before Mt. Huma.
4 x Cav
1 Gar in Harbin to keep the Manchurians in line and prevent air dropped troops from taking it.
4 Homengun, from Mt. Huma to Gen He
3 InfA + 2 InfT
Moukogo Gun, from Qagan to Qagan Qulut - 3 divisions
2 InfE - for the 2 extremely endangered provinces.
2 Cav,
2 InfA, InfT
3 Homengun, empty to join Kita-Shina Ichigun for filling up.
Dalian
Gar + art - We don't want to lose this as our forefathers lost so much blood over.
Jinxi
Gar - the Manchurians don't value harbours so we must defend it for them.
Offensive deployment.
Kita-Shina ichigun Chinese defence force.
The Divine wind corps (Kamikaza) mobile units with support IST.
1 x 1xL.Arm 1xmot 1xcav 1xAC - CA bonus
2 x 2 x mot 1xAC, later to be reinforced with L.Arm. (made from Tokyo mot and Taiwan mot, Tokyo to get replacement Inf combined with the surplus Art). Later CA bonus.
2 x 2xinf 1xist 1xAC - with 2 AC armour upgrades this gives CA bonus.
Production needs
Now we already are missing 9 infantry brigades.
Two more that need to replace the Tokyo Imperial Guard.
Then we need 70 divisions more for China given that we already got the Divine Wind Corps.
So we need to build 160 infantry brigades.
We got the following surplus support units
6 Art
10 AC
5 Eng
which can be distributed among the units.
Clearly there is a major gab in our expectations since you only think 36 infantry brigades are missing.
This is only for a defensive deployment against the Soviets and starting hostility with the Chinese, offensive operations in any of the 7 other directions is not included though a total defeat of China would free up units for a foundation of these needs.
In the needs Mnt or Mar can substitute nearly any of the infantry.
General Surt
Mt. Huma
Btw. It freezes a lot up here as it does in the Chinese mountains, we should make Arctic Warfare Equipment a priority to lessen attrition and improve our moral.
Edit: The IST would need more to get to CA, slight miscalculation.
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