In 1944, outside the city of Guilin, 150,000 Japanese troops could not be attacked for a long time, and under the rapid defeat, the Japanese commander ordered that poison gas bombs be dropped on the city of Guilin, and suddenly more than 7,000 defenders in the city were killed!
In this battle, the Japanese army captured the important town of Guilin in Guangxi at the cost of 30,000 casualties, and the garrison in Guilin was the Gui ace Seventh Army, known as the "wolf soldiers", who resisted the Japanese attack with 20,000 people for more than a month. In the end, all of them were heroically sacrificed, and none of them surrendered!
Since then, the "wolf soldiers" in Guangxi have been deeply jealous of the Japanese army, and even more Veterans of the Japanese Army have claimed, "The Battle of Guilin was the most tragic battle I ever participated in!" ”
Let's take a look at the Guangxi "wolf soldiers" who supported the backbone of the nation during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression and understand the glorious past!
Guangxi "wolf soldiers" have existed since ancient times, the earliest written record is in the Ming Dynasty, when the southeast coastal areas, often suffered from the invasion of the Wokou, Guangxi local toast in order to resist the invasion of the Wokou, ordered the conscription of soldiers, to pacify the Wokou.
Defense of Guilin
At that time, the "wolf soldiers" were also called "soldiers", which was originally a local military guard system, specially used for "suppressing bandits", and later the military system was scattered, local collusion, and serious corruption, in order to resist the Wokou, the conscription system was reformed.
Guangxi "wolf soldiers" were born since then, the combat effectiveness of the wolf soldiers is extremely strong, in the history of the Ming Dynasty has been recorded, during the Ming Dynasty, there were Wokou landing, Wokou ravaging the township, wolf soldiers in order to eliminate the Wokou, and the Wokou for several days without retreating, and finally completely annihilated this Wokou.
After the good news was submitted, it also received official commendations from the Ming Dynasty, and the reputation of "wolf soldiers" has also spread since then, and there are many records of "wolf soldiers" in local county records in Guangxi.
In fact, Guangxi is located in the remote south, where the mountains are densely forested, and there are "miasmas" for many years, and medical technology in ancient times was not developed, so Guangxi was rarely inhabited.
In addition, the mountains and forests are dense, the forest poisons snakes, and there are many beasts, so for a long time, Guangxi has been in a backward and closed state, which is often used as a place for the Central Plains Dynasty to exile prisoners.
It is also the harsh natural environment that makes the residents living here develop a very tough personality, as the main gathering area of the Zhuang people, most of the civilians living here have the habit of practicing martial arts and practicing boxing.
National Army
The boxing technique they practiced was called "Gu Zhuang Quan", which was later spread to Thailand and improved to form today's "Muay Thai", but compared to Muay Thai, Gu Zhuang Quan is more ferocious!
Guangxi people practice boxing one to strengthen their body, and the other is to have the ability to resist when they encounter danger.
Under all kinds of harsh conditions, poisonous snakes, beasts of prey, and plagues, the people of Guangxi have developed a character of "the sky is not afraid, the earth is not afraid", they dare to fight with the beasts of prey, dare to fight against the enemy who violates the border, and the power of the wolf soldiers has spread all over the world.
In modern times, China has been bullied by Western powers, which have set off a frenzy to divide China, and during the Northern Expedition, Guangxi has also sent troops to follow Dr. Sun Yat-sen, hoping to calm the chaotic world and restore peace to the world, but unfortunately it ultimately failed.
In 1931, the Japanese Kwantung Army launched the September 18 Incident and invaded northeast China; in 1932, it launched the 128 Incident and stationed itself in Shanghai; in 1934, it launched the "North China Incident" in an attempt to split China and implement the autonomy of the five provinces of North China.
Faced with Japan's pressing step by step, Chiang Kai-shek, under the persuasion of Zhang Xueliang, Yang Hucheng, communists and democrats, agreed to jointly resist Japan and cooperate with the Communist Party of China to establish an anti-Japanese national united front.
Diagram
After the July 7 Incident in 1937, Chiang Kai-shek issued a call that "there is no distinction between the north and the south of the land, no one is old or young, and everyone has the responsibility to defend the land and resist the war." In the face of the national crisis, the Wolf Soldiers in Guangxi once again demonstrated their fearless spirit of patriotic dedication.
On August 13, the Japanese army shelled Shanghai, the Battle of Songhu began, the Japanese army once said before the war, rampantly, "Destroy China in three months!" In order to win the Battle of Songhu, Chiang Kai-shek mobilized heavy troops and resisted with all his might.
On the battlefield of Songhu, Chiang Kai-shek mobilized more than fifty divisions of the Central Army of his entire consortial army, including the German Mechanic Division! At the same time, he also ordered all local troops to immediately rush to the aid of Shanghai.
Bai Chongxi ordered the recruitment of troops in Guangxi, preparing to form the 11th and 21st Group Armies, and the brave, martial and patriotic Guangxi people actively signed up in the face of conscription.
Originally scheduled to recruit 100,000 soldiers, but the number of applicants was as high as more than one million, and finally the recruitment office had to adopt the method of drawing lots to select soldiers, but even so, the will to fight of the troops was still high.
At the most difficult time when the Battle of Songhu was going on, the newly recruited Guangxi army rushed thousands of miles to help the Songhu battlefield, although they wore straw shoes and most of the guns they took were made in Hanyang, there were no planes, and there were not many mortars.
Still
But with its own will to fight, as well as the spirit of not being afraid of death, as soon as they arrived at the battlefield, they went to the front line, facing the Japanese tanks, artillery, three-eight rifles, gui soldiers never gave up, they used bayonets to fight the Japanese army bloodily.
In order to win the Battle of Songhu, the Japanese army mobilized domestic armor divisions and regiments, and also ordered the navy to support the operation, and the Japanese aircraft bombed the defenders' positions every day, and the Chinese army suffered heavy casualties.
Chiang Kai-shek had to order a retreat and ordered the Gui Dynasty Empress, and this Guangxi soldier, who had poor weapons and seriously undertrained soldiers, resolutely accepted this arduous task.
They took the "old sleeve" in their hands and fought fiercely with the pursuing Japanese army for several days, at the cost of more than 10,000 Guangxi soldiers sleeping here, and they successfully covered the retreat of the main force of the Nationalist army.
In the Battle of Songhu, the Gui clan suffered more than 60,000 casualties, accounting for more than half of the total troops of the Gui clan participating in the battle, and the Battle of Songhu also broke the Japanese army's wild words of "destroying China in three months"!
After the Battle of Wuhan, the War of Resistance entered a stalemate stage, although the Japanese army was unable to organize a large-scale frontal battle, but in general, the Japanese army still occupied the main urban areas of China and was in an advantageous position.
Guilin after being bombed
After the outbreak of the Pacific War, the U.S. army entered the war, and after the Battle of Midway, the main force of the Japanese Navy suffered serious losses, until 1944, when the main force of the Japanese Navy was completely annihilated by the U.S. army, and the remaining navy could only garrison the mainland.
Under these circumstances, the Japanese army wanted to open up the land communication line in Southeast Asia, and also tried to force the Chongqing government to surrender, so under the planning of the Japanese "base camp", the Japanese army dispatched the command to china to draw up a battle plan.
The Japanese army gathered more than 200,000 troops, hundreds of tanks, and more than 100 warplanes to prepare to launch an attack on The southwest region of China, with the purpose of opening up the land communication line between Southeast Asia and the Chinese battlefield, which was called the "Battle of Yuxianggui".
After the battle began, in order to capture the important town of Guilin in Guangxi, the Japanese army gathered 120,000 troops, equipped with more than 100 tanks, more than 30 heavy artillery, and supported by fighters.
In order to defend Guilin, Chiang Kai-shek also mobilized heavy troops to guard it, but in order to weaken the Gui clan, Chiang Kai-shek secretly and continuously "laid down black hands", not only transferring all the troops of the clan, but also cutting off support.
This caused Guilin's defensive strength to be reduced from one army plus four divisions to only two divisions of the Gui clan! Although there are only two divisions, a total of more than 20,000 people, backward weapons, insufficient firepower, but this is the real elite of the Gui clan, "wolf soldiers"!
On October 8, the Japanese army began to assemble, while sending the vanguard troops to explore the way, the main force of the Japanese army after the assembly, all the way south, to break through the multi-layered defense line of the national army, a large number of national troops collapsed without a fight.
On the 17th, the Japanese army successfully launched a general attack on Guilin, and since then the defense of Guilin has officially begun, and the guards have been guarded at this time in the 131st Division and 170th Division of the Gui clan, they are defending according to danger, and there are more mountains in the Guilin area, and the defenders will use the terrain outside the city to carry out the blockade.
In the mountain area, the Japanese tanks could not exert their strength, so they had to order the artillery units to continuously bombard the defenders, and at the same time ordered fighters to harass the defenders.
Under the bombardment of the Japanese artillery, the garrison suffered heavy casualties, coupled with the lack of prevention and control facilities, the behavior of the troops was detected by the Japanese reconnaissance aircraft, so it was repeatedly blocked and defeated.
After half a month of defensive battle outside the city, the positions outside the city, Pingfeng Mountain and Mao'er Mountain, were lost one after another, and the defenders were forced to retreat into the city to resist, and the Japanese army was able to cut off the Communication Channel of the Guilin Defenders to the outside world.
On November 5, the Japanese army, under the cover of heavy artillery, launched an offensive against the city of Guilin, and the exhausted defenders, unable to resist the Japanese artillery fire, once again retreated to the vicinity of Seven Star Rock to hold firm.
Since then, the Battle of Guilin has entered the most brutal stage of street fighting, but even so, the garrison still did not give up, let alone surrender, even if more than 20,000 people only had more than 7,000 left!
The defenders, who suffered heavy casualties, built a defensive line at Seven Star Rock, and at this time the Japanese tanks had a place to play, and they constantly charged at the defenders.
In order to blow up these tanks, the defenders organized death squads, each of them tied a large amount of explosives, they ambushed on the side of the road, waiting for the tanks to march, and then rushed up to detonate the explosives on their bodies, and died with the tanks!
The defenders concentrated the only ammunition they had, using the terrain to build fire points, the Japanese charge was repulsed again and again, and in a hurry, the Japanese decided to drop poison gas bombs at the seven star rock defenders!
Under the attack of the Japanese army's poison gas bombs, most of the more than 7,000 defenders stationed at Qixingyan were killed, and the remnants were also slaughtered by the crazy Japanese army.
The Japanese casualties were close to 30,000, and the combat effectiveness of the Guangxi wolf soldiers completely shook the Japanese army, and the surviving Japanese veterans claimed, "This battle is the most tragic one I have ever participated in!" ”