Chapter VI: Kuroki Sakusen
Part IV: October 19 – November 9
Knowing that his northern front was safe, as Imamura had yet to reach Wonsan, the Chinese lieutenant general Huang Xiansheng attacked with five divisions southward out of Chunchon toward Busan. This battle, following hard on the earlier defensive fight Hata had masterminded, was a desperate one. Within the space of an hour, Hata knew that he could not withstand the pressure emanating from the north and ordered Osami out into Tsushima Strait. A mere seven hours after the beginning of the Chinese attack, Japanese troops were shamefully mobbing the southern beaches of Busan, throwing away weapons and equipment in a desperate attempt to get aboard Osami’s transports.
In the end, a large proportion of Hata’s corps survived and, by some divine stroke of fortune, the Chinese navy did not appear, thus passing up a golden opportunity of Japanese chaos. Osami, acting on his own fine initiative, ran his transports northward and into the minor natural harbor at Wonsan. Between the sudden appearance of Hata’s troops in that town late on the 20th and the arrival of Imamura’s marines early on the 21st, the Chinese advance, which had been weakened by the attack on Busan, collapsed on itself due to Japanese resistance. One can only speculate whether our later fortunes would have turned for the better if Okamura had succumbed to Imamura’s pressure earlier and allowed Imamura to be in place in Wonsan up to a week earlier. The whole campaign may have played out differently if the Chinese did not have the capacity to concentrate all their strength in Chunchon on pushing into Busan.
Nonetheless, our main foothold on the mainland remained intact, as only the minor Busan beachhead had been eradicated and even then, there was no permanent damage to the Imperial Japanese Army, though the manpower and equipment losses did exacerbate the problems of Japanese home industry, which was already being overstretched by the need to replace all of Ozawa’s lost bombers. Unfortunately, the Chinese were not willing to wait for our forces to regain their strength.
Two hours after midday on the 22nd, General Xu Yongchang ordered his six divisions at Andong, a sum of one more than we had anticipated, to attack Ishiwara’s two divisions at Sinuiju over the Yalu. Ishiwara attempted to hold as best he could, but his two divisions were overstretched against such a concentration of force and could not prevent pontoon bridges from springing up all along the Yalu River. He was forced to disengage and withdraw southward toward Pyongyang by sunrise on the 23rd. Our northern defenses were breaking.
It was at this critical stage that Hata, ever the optimist, saw a glimpse of a possibility to break the deadlock in the south early on the 25th. Acting on this opportunity, he threw Imamura’s marine corps southward toward Chunchon, which had been nearly completely denuded of its defenses so that the Chinese could make their attack on Busan. Unfortunately for both Hata’s plans and Imamura’s marines, the one remaining division was commanded by Lietenant General Pan Wenhua, a veteran of both the Soviet and German Fronts and was quite experienced. Finding his outflanking and breakthrough attempts stymied at every turn, Imamura was forced to resort to costly assaults to break Pan Wenhua’s defenses, but break them he did, after twenty-three hours of vicious combat.
However, Pan Wenhua had bought the necessary time. Imamura’s progess was slowed to the point that by the 30th he had not yet taken Chunchon, and Chinese reinforcements were pouring in. The first to arrive was a single division commanded by a Major General Li Mi, who ranked among the bottom ranks of the Chinese Imperial General Staff and was easily overwhelmed. Twelve hours later, however, General Golpurchin appeared, also with but one division, and was also thrown back. These subsequent skirmishes, however, gave Xu Yongchang the time needed to reach Sinuiju and attack southward toward Wonsan.
Coordinating with the Chinese forces in Seoul, Xu Yongchang quickly took advantage of Hata’s and Imamura’s distractions around Chunchon and attacked with six divisions from two directions. Hata was forced not only to call off the advance toward Wonsan but also to order spoiling attacks toward both Seoul and Sinuiju in desperate attempts to halt the Chinese advance. Yamashita, with his one mountain division assaulted westward out of Hyesan toward Sinuiju, supported by Okamura’s corps in Pyongyang. At the same time, Ishiwara sent his two divisions southward to attempt to ward off the Chinese thrust out of Seoul. Both these attempts failed and, as a consequence, Yamashita’s troops were too spent to deflect another Chinese thrust over the Yalu and were forced to withdraw toward Hamhung. Hata and Imamura could not hold against the Chinese assaults, especially once the Chunchon units had joined in, and withdrew toward Hamhung as well. By November 8, Ishiwara and Okamura were isolated in Pyongyang and Hata ordered them evacuated either to Fukuoka or, if the situation was stabilized to his satisfaction, to Hamhung.
One may wonder what I was doing during this time of crisis, for I seem to be forgetting myself. To be honest, I believe that both Hata and the Chinese had as well. Hata sent no orders to me during this time, but was apparently content to keep me positioned along the northernmost stretches of the Yalu River. I can understand why, however; if we were to be pushed to within the perimeters of merely Hamhung and its immediate surrounding area, the larger part of the Imperial Japanese Army could have been totally destroyed. As for the Chinese, to this day I do not know why they did not attack; surely my defensive positions were not so formidable; they had more resources placed around the hills of Chongyin, ready to attack, than they committed to their assault on the mountains of Hyesan. Of course, my division was fresh, unlike Yamashita’s, but against odds of up to eight-to-one, I could have done nothing.
Unfortunately for any and all of Hata’s plans, as Tanaka’s and Osami’s transports, bearing Ishiwara’s and Okamura’s divisions, were leaving Pyongyang Harbor they were spotted and assaulted by the Chinese blockade, which consisted of two squadrons of destroyers. These two admirals faced a grave decision, whether they should press on toward Japan or turn back into Pyongyang and allow the land forces to face potential annihilation, if the Chinese coordinated an attack strong enough. Such a prospect was, of course, hardly beyond their capabilities, as their dramatic break of Japanese lines had shown. One must also recognize that, irony of ironies, our reinforcements had assembled in Fukuoka on the 9th, the very day Okamura and Ishiwara were evacuating Pyongyang.
The situation in Korea was becoming quite grim by the 9th of November.
