Mentioning the Battle of Guanjia'an during the Hundred Regiments War in 1940 is still heartbreaking. In this battle, the casualty figures of the enemy and us are an unavoidable issue, and it is also one of the focal points of the debate over the success or failure of the Battle of Guanjia'an for many years.
Regarding the losses of the Japanese army, the 129th Division said in a telegram dated October 31, 1940: "The Japanese suffered more than 500 casualties and more than 100 corpses." The ensuing war report No. 240 gave a more detailed figure: "More than 280 corpses of the enemy, and three piles of ashes were burned with gunpowder, about 50 people." According to the exhumation of dead bodies, it was learned that there were two lieutenant officers, four lieutenant officers, one second lieutenant officer, two other Japanese wounded soldiers, seventy rifles, nine grenadiers, bullets, military supplies, and more than ten war horses." This figure has been widely cited by later historians.
At the end of 1940, the 129th Division said in the "Summary of the Hundred Regiments Of the 129th Division", "More than 400 enemies were killed and wounded, and our army also suffered casualties, and Comrade Fan Zixia, the commander of our tenth brigade, was also wounded."
The Japanese army said in the "Independent Mixed 4th Brigade Phase 2 Jinzhong Operation": "50 people were killed, 99 were wounded, and 2 were captured." According to this statement, the Okazaki detachment lost less than one-third of its men and horses, so how could it be finally expelled from the Top of the Sekiga family and compressed into the row of caves on the mountainside? In addition, there is a widely circulated Japanese version that says "61 survivors of Guan Jia'an and 142 on the willow tree", which calculates that about 300 Japanese troops were killed, which is closer to the Chinese figure. There were only 61 Japanese troops left on the Guanjia'an, which was also in line with the logic of the remnants of the Japanese army being expelled from the top of the embankment and retreating to the caves.
The casualty figures of the Japanese army are inconsistent, and the casualties of the Eighth Route Army are even more suspicious. According to the Eighth Route Army's Hundred Regiments Battle Report No. 235, more than 600 people were killed and wounded under Fan Zixia, commander of the New 10th Brigade. Later generations of mainstream war history books basically cite this number.
However, as many as 8 regiments of the Eighth Route Army directly participated in the Battle of Guanjia'an, with a total number of tens of thousands. If only more than 600 casualties were inflicted, would it shake liu bocheng, Chen Geng and other famous generals who had been in battle for a long time? For this reason, he repeatedly asked to withdraw the siege and find another fighter, and did not hesitate to argue with Peng Dehuai? So much so that Peng Dehuai issued threats such as "revoking the number" and "killing the head"? Logically, this makes no sense.
A closer look at the provenance of the figure of more than 600 casualties reveals that it came from a telegram from the 129th Division on October 31. At this time, the battle of Guanjia'an was not over, the battlefield statistics were certainly not complete, and in the fierce battles that followed, the Eighth Route Army paid a heavy price. In addition, the headquarters special task force regiment does not belong to the combat sequence of the 129th Division, so there is every reason to believe that the figure of more than 600 people is not complete.
In addition to the mainstream data of more than 600 casualties, Chen Geng once recalled that the Eighth Route Army suffered more than 2,000 casualties in this battle. In recent years, with the deepening of research, some new theories have emerged about the number of casualties. According to Hao Xueting, director of the Research Department of the Taihang Anti-Japanese War Memorial Hall of the Eighth Route Army, there is a martyr's tomb in Guanjia'an and Feng'an, and the people who buried the remains of the martyrs said that each martyr's tomb buried the remains of more than 1,000 martyrs, and some of the seriously injured died of their injuries after the war.
The "People's Liberation Army Daily" once published a letter from Zhang Jinxiang, a local veteran in Wuxiang, mentioning that the Eighth Route Army suffered thousands of casualties and thousands of martyrs. It can be seen that in Wuxiang, there are different views on the casualty figures of the Eighth Route Army in the Battle of Guanjia'an. In order to understand the actual casualties of the Eighth Route Army, we can only look for clues from the war history and public publications of each regiment.
The 772nd Regiment, the number one main force of the 386th Brigade, was later developed into the 109th Regiment of the 37th Division of the 13th Army. The regiment said in the battle history that the whole regiment suffered more than 200 casualties in the battle of Guanjia'an. In the "Legend of the 13th Army", it is said that the unit suffered more than 180 casualties in this battle alone. This statement is partially corroborated by the "Brief History of the 37th Infantry Division", "the 1st Company fought with the enemy four times, and only three men remained in the battle". The 1st Battalion suffered such heavy casualties, what about the other two battalions?
According to the "Brief History of the 13th Army", the 772nd Regiment, under the condition of a large reduction in the number of combatants in various companies, twice gathered cadres above the platoon level and cadres of organs to participate in the charge. If the whole regiment only suffered more than 200 casualties, as for the lack of combatants in the company, would it be necessary to gather cadres twice to participate in the charge?
Regarding the casualties of the 16th Regiment, no exact data have been found at present. The "Brief History of the Thirty-seventh Infantry Division" says that in the third stage of the Hundred Regiments War, the 16th Regiment and the 772nd Regiment suffered a total of more than 350 casualties. If the casualties of more than 200 people mentioned in the history of the 109th Regiment are excluded, then the 3rd stage of the 16th Regiment hundred regiments war only suffered more than 100 casualties. However, the 16th Regiment fought from beginning to end at Guanjia'an, would the casualties really be so small?
The casualty figures of the 28th Regiment of the New 10th Brigade are also unverifiable. The regiment withdrew as a brigade reserve after only one attack at Guanjia'an, and the casualties should not be large compared with other regiments.
Li Desheng, then commander of the 1st Battalion of the 769th Regiment, said in his memoirs that the 1st Battalion suffered heavy casualties when attacking through the trail that his determination to fight was shaken. In addition, the 1st and 3rd battalions of the regiment participated in 18 charge during the general offensive on the afternoon of the 31st. After the battle, Chen Geng said to He Zhengwen, who was the chief of staff of the regiment: "The battle was very brutal, the 769th Regiment fought very hard, the losses were relatively large, and it was not easy to recover in a short period of time." How many casualties can a main regiment not recover in a short period of time?
The headquarters special task force regiment was later developed into a 31st division. According to the "History of the Third Civil Revolutionary War of the Thirty-first Division's War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression", the 2nd and 3rd battalions and regiments of the Special Agent Regiment paid a great price in the battle of Guanjia'an. After the war, the regiment was downsized from 13 infantry companies and 1 machine gun company to 9 companies. The strength of the headquarters special service regiment participating in the hundred regiments was more than 3,000 people, counting that each company had about 200 people, downsizing 4 companies, and reducing casualties by at least 700 to 800 people. According to the recollection of the regimental commander Ou Fufu, the regiment did not experience major battles in the Battle of the Hundred Regiments, only the regimental zhihe 2nd battalion and 3rd battalions participated in the battle of Guangzhishan, and the casualties in this battle were only more than 40 people, that is to say, most of the casualties came from the battle of Guanjia'an.
Of the total casualties of the Eighth Route Army, the 25th and 38th regiments of the 1st Column accounted for a considerable proportion. Before the Battle of the Hundred Regiments, both regiments were fully packed regiments with 2,200 and 2,600 men, respectively. In the Hundred Regiments War, the 38th Regiment added 3 more recruit companies, so the total strength of these two regiments participating in the Hundred Regiments War reached more than 5,000 people.
However, after the battle of Guanjia'an, the two regiments, including the personnel of the regimental organs, each had only more than 200 people left. That is to say, the two regiments lost a total of about 4600 personnel in the three stages of the Hundred Regiments War. According to the "History of the Development of the 1st Column of Decisive Death", the 25th and 38th Regiments lost nearly 500 people and wounded more than 1,500 people in the 1st and 2nd stages of the Hundred Regiments Battle. The two regiments were reduced by about 2600 men in the third phase.
Before the Battle of Guanjia'an, the 25th Regiment suffered heavy losses in the Battle of Wenzhuang, with more than 400 casualties. As a result, the 25th and 38th Regiments lost about 2,200 men in the Battle of Guanjia'an. This estimate is corroborated by the "Brief History of the Struggle of the Fortieth Army Division". According to the "Brief History", in the battle of Guanjia'an, more than 1570 people of the 1 column were killed and 589 people were killed.
The 25th and 38th regiments suffered heavy casualties in the Battle of Guanjia'an, which can be seen from the course of the battle. When the 25th Regiment lost Willow Ridge, it had already suffered a lot of casualties. In the ensuing counter-offensive, the 25th Regiment attacked 7 times and the 38th Regiment attacked 4 times. According to the "History of the 119th Infantry Regiment", the combatants of the 38th Regiment were sacrificed, and the concentrated troops charged, including Huang Zhenrong, the commander of the 2nd Battalion, who was wounded, and dozens of others, including Deputy Battalion Commander Jia Baoshan, Commissioner Wang Sizhong, Company Commander Zhang Bingxie, Chen Jiangang, and Instructor Hao Shuangma, were killed. Despite this, in the final general offensive, the 25th and 38th regiments each cobbled together a battalion and launched 18 consecutive charges.
In summary, in the Battle of Guanjia'an, the total number of casualties of the Eighth Route Army is probably more than 3,000.
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About the author of the public account: Wang Zhengxing, a former officer of a field unit of the People's Liberation Army, has served in infantry detachments, headquarters, logistics departments and other units, is committed to the study of war history and tactics, and has a unique understanding of military tactics and non-war operations. His book "This is War" was recommended in two issues in May and June 2014 by Phoenix TV's "Eight Minutes of Open Volume" column. His public account name is also "This is war", welcome to pay attention