Chapter Five, Part Five: Sino-Japanese War / War with the Allies
Jun 1943 - Oct 1943
Previously in the Influence Wars...
The Americans recaptured Honolulu, Midway, Palmyra and Jarvis without much opposition. However, the IJN scored major victories against the Royal Navy and Japanese troops conquered most of Sumatra. In China, progress was made in the South and the North, with the Central Front being a stalemate.
In Europe, the Axis forces are hard pressed everywhere and in Africa, only one pocket of Axis resistance remains.
And now, the conclusion...
War in China
Some of our troops in the South were exposed to counter-attacks in June, which the Chinese took advantage of by striking in the south-western part of the frontline. Still, throughout most of June and July things were mostly going as planned and we advanced northward in order to prepare for a decisive strike in Central China. As usual, advancing troops left piles of bodies of soldiers from both sides behind them. Battle of Wugang was probably the worst - with more than ten thousand men dead, it was almost literally a meat-grinder.
However, the main push began during late July and we came close to destroying several Chinese divisions in two pockets in August. Unfortunately, in the end we were repulsed and no Chinese divisions were destroyed. Since some of the troops from the South were transferred to the Centre, it is possible that lack of reserves in the South affected the outcome, especially considering the fact that the Central HQ failed to push forward despite having roughly 75% of the forces that the Southern HQ had.
Despite being pushed back a bit, our forces were still strong enough to perform offensive actions and it was believed that the Chinese troops were weakened after their counter-strikes, which happened many times before. Unfortunately, the second attempt at delivering the final blow in Central China also failed, with the lost battle of Madiyi being the culminating point of the offensive. In some parts of the Southern Front we gained more ground than during the first offensive, but as of the 2nd of October, many of our troops are exhausted and two of our divisions are trapped in the south-west. It may still be possible to take Madiyi, but the Chinese managed to evacuate most of their troops from the regions east of this province.
The Administration believes that the enemy will now try to perform a strong attack in the weaker parts of our frontline and overrun troops stationed in exposed positions, which is a typical Chinese strategy. It may be prudent to adopt a defensive posture for a month or so in order to blunt the Chinese counter-offensive and give our troops time to reorganise and regroup. We believe that it may also be too late to save the two divisions that were trapped in the south-west.
The performance of the Central HQ was a big disappointment and the Central Front was mostly a stalemate. The Central HQ managed to advance only in places where it was supported by the North-Eastern HQ, i.e. in areas west of Wanxian. Wanxian itself is a place which the soldiers believe to be cursed and its strategic location (north of Chongqing) makes it the most formidable and the most important obstacle on our path.
On the contrary, the North-Eastern HQ made substantial gains pretty much everywhere. We even managed to cut off the bulk of the communist forces from their capital. However, it should be noted that infrastructure in this region is particularly bad and it will be hard to continue offensive actions at this pace.
The North HQ was stripped of its most able officers and left with orders to hold its position. Given the circumstances, it performed reasonably well, but the nationalists captured Yullin.
Overview of our position in China
*Logistical maps are available here.
The Pacific Theatre
Harsh fighting continued on Sumatra throughout June and July. The Allies were entrenched in Oosthaven, but in June they were even able to launch some limited counter-attacks. Also, despite our best efforts, the Allies managed to bring reinforcements to Sumatra by sea, although it should be noted that most of the Allied transport ships were eventually sunk.
The final assault on Oosthaven both began and was concluded in August. The battle involved around 100 thousand troops and the defenders were outnumbered, outgunned and bombarded from the sea, but the city was still a tough nut to crack. They fought bravely, but it was a battle they could not have possibly won and they knew it. Still, stubborn Allied defence confined us for a long time to Sumatra and the invasion of Java could begin only in the middle of August.
We faced a similar situation as on Sumatra on Borneo, but this time the conditions were more favourable for the Allies. With the bulk of our fleet and our land forces in the South Pacific occupied on Sumatra, the Allies were able to easily reinforce their forces on Borneo. This made our advance painfully slow in the region which was declared as conquered a long time ago.
With Oosthaven captured, our forces were able to successfully invade western Java. The Allied forces are disorganised, but Java is a big island and it is possible that the enemy will be able to create a coherent frontline on the eastern tip of the island.
The battles were raging not only on land and in the air, but also at sea - our fleets continued the blockade of the Sunda Strait and destroyed many Allied ships. Those were mostly the vessels which were trapped in Oosthaven and Batavia, but the provided list also includes the ships which came to the rescue of the trapped fleets and many submarines. Unfortunately, one of our destroyer groups was destroyed by friendly fire. After Oosthaven and Batavia were taken, our fleets were moved to Singapore for repairs.
The Allied naval efforts were poorly coordinated, which leads us to believe that they will greatly limit their activity in the region in the near future. In fact, they may be forced to do that even if they do not want to, because during the recent months the Royal Navy has been decimated. However, the enemy still posses the ability to conduct limited engagements in the South Pacific and the high number of naval bases in the South Pacific means that nothing short of the conquest of Australia and the whole of Oceania will ever eliminate the Allied threat fully. The Allied successes at reinforcing their troops mean that we will either need to maintain a sizeable garrison on the conquered islands or keep patrolling the region on a regular basis if we hope to hold the South Pacific islands.
Overview of our position in the South Pacific
Overview of our position in the Central Pacific
The action in the Central Pacific was limited to submarine attacks on convoys and aircraft attacks on submarines. One of our own submarine groups was destroyed by American aircraft while it was gathering intelligence in the Hawaii Region.
Recent lack of activity is probably the result of a new, cautious American strategy - it is clear that they do not want to repeat the same mistakes they made in the previous years. However, this also means that the enemy is most likely strengthening his positions and preparing another strike. Nevertheless, we were able to reinforce some key Central Pacific islands with additional troops and we still control Hana.
Other matters
Much has happened in Europe and on the political front. At first the Axis scored some successes. They managed to stabilise the situation in Yugoslavia and eventually conquered the country. They also destroyed the Allied bridgehead in France and captured thousands of soldiers who were not evacuated in time. However, at the same time the last pocket of Axis resistance in Africa was destroyed and the position in the East was rapidly deteriorating. Therefore, August saw a largely unexpected event - the fall of the German Fuhrer, Adolf Hitler.
On 22th of August, Adolf Hitler was killed by a bomb placed in his bunker in Eastern Prussia. The German political elites were fed up with the hard-liner Nazis who coloured everything in white even when it was black. The German population is also very tired of constant fighting. Nevertheless, war in Europe continues.
In Spain, back-and-forth warfare which characterises this theatre is still ongoing. The Allies are now on the defensive.
The Axis focus on the Western Front (France and Spain) and Yugoslavia allowed the Red Army to gain momentum in the East and it will be now very hard to regain the initiative for the Axis. It is possible that this may never happen, which would mean that the fall of the Axis alliance is now inevitable.
All these events, combined with the events in Asia, had immense political repercussions. Global balance of power is changing, with the influence of the British Empire and the German Reich decreasing and the influence of the United States of America, the Soviet Union and the Japanese Empire increasing. Much of the British public opinion believes that the UK's declaration of war on Japan served only American interests. Considering that the Japanese focus on the South Pacific allowed the Americans to advance in the Central Pacific largely unopposed, this opinion seems somewhat justified. Many nationalists and more radical conservatives are also emphasising the fact that the Royal Navy suffered much bigger losses during the defence of Sumatra and Java than during the defence of Hong Kong and the Malaya. Some politicians are demanding the resignation of Churchill, whose popularity has largely declined. His defenders claim that the unity of effort comes first before nationalistic sentiments. Roosevelt, on the other hand, has regained much of the lost popularity during several recent months - the size and power of the American military is increasing every day, Honolulu and several other Pacific islands are in the American hands again and the US economy is stronger than ever and even for Roosevelt's political enemies, it is hard to defend the claim that the USA is NOT the Arsenal of Democracy. Our intelligence shows that the Americans intend to hold their Pacific possessions and expand their influence by advancing slowly but methodically, without taking unnecessary risks.
The Allies, especially the British, are now heavily pressing Stalin to declare war on the Empire of Japan. They claim that the Soviet successes would not have been possible without the Allied actions in Spain, France and Yugoslavia and that the "Japanese threat" has to be contained while Japan is still engaged in China. Officially the Soviets show no intent of joining the war in Asia, but it is well known that they are not friends of the Empire and would gladly expand their influence in the Asian continent. The real question is how persuasive the Allies can be and how successful the Red Army will be in the Europe.
The peculiar position of Churchill forced him to come up with a new justification for continuing the war effort in Asia. The British and the Americans certainly agree on one thing - they have a higher chance of concluding the war successfully within a reasonable period of time in both Europe and Asia if they stand united. Both Roosevelt and Churchill have to defend de facto failed preventive strikes (in the sense that they did not achieve the results they wanted quickly) and believe that "only a fool would wait for the enemy to become stronger before making his own move". This is an issue which will no doubt be debated for years to come. Still, no matter how one looks at it, the scope of the British-American cooperation is unprecedented and half of the world is a part of the Allied alliance. Therefore,
in a joint statement, President Roosevelt, Prime Minister Churchill and various heads of states and governments of the Allied nations announced that in order to strengthen the position and unity of the Allied alliance and the democratic countries in the global balance of power, all negotiations with all belligerent nations will be conducted by the alliance as a whole and no separate peace treaty with any of the belligerent nations will be signed. The international nature and gravitas of the statement mean that it will be hard to ignore it even if the opposition political parties come to power in the UK, the USA or the other, smaller Allied nations. The declaration is likely supposed to serve as a guarantee of the American involvement in the war in Europe and the Commonwealth involvement in the war in Asia.
What this means in practice is that we will have to ensure that our strategic position is strong enough in order to force the whole Allied bloc to come to terms with us. However, the declaration also hints at the fact that a conditional peace is not just our delusion and daydream, but a viable possibility. We no longer have to wonder whether the only peace offer will be the one of unconditional surrender, as it seems certain that if the circumstances are right, the Allies will be willing to sign a conditional peace treaty with us. Obviously, it is far too early to declare what the terms of this potential treaty could be.
The amount of resources flowing in from conquered territories is astonishing - it seems that we have enough resources in order to continue the war for a long time. However, high activity of our merchant marine also means that the Allied submarines have more targets than ever and the submarine threat is bigger than ever, indeed. Oil is now our prime concern - thanks to our conquests significant quantities of this resource arrive at ports in Japan every day and thanks to our modern synthetic fuel plants we can also convert much of our energy into oil.
A new warship - a cruiser IJN Sakwa - has been recently constructed. Hopefully, we will be able to construct enough modern cruisers in order to ensure that our Navy remains a capable fighting force in the following years.
After the new heavy fighter wing was formed, a decision was made to reduce aircraft production to quantities which will be sufficient to cover our losses only, without expanding the size of the airforce, since there are many other projects that require considerable funding.
Japan is one of the world leaders in many technological fields, but this comes at a price - the industrial capabilities of our Nation are insufficient to cover all the needs of the military modernisation program, which means that in many cases it only receives partial funding in order not to disrupt standard production too much.
*The tech screens can be checked here.