Many people do not know that before the outbreak of the All-out War of Resistance in 1937, the closest relations with the Chinese Nationalist government were not Britain and the United States, but Germany and Italy, especially Nazi Germany. It can even be said that until the early days of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, before the German-Italian-Japanese alliance, Germany's relations with China, which were engaged in the War of Resistance, were better than most people imagined.
Nazi Germany fought fiercely with the Nationalist government, to put it bluntly, that is, the resource-poor Germany wanted to climb out of the quagmire of the defeat of the "First World War" and needed the support of overseas markets and resources. In particular, after Hitler came to power in Germany in 1932, he openly reorganized his armaments, and the demand for strategic resources such as tungsten, antimony, and tin increased sharply. Among them, tungsten is an indispensable raw material for the manufacture of guns. In the 1930s, two-thirds of the world's proven tungsten reserves were in China, and two-thirds of China's tungsten reserves were in Gannan Province, where tungsten sand production was nearly half of global production.
At that time, the Nationalist government, which was also eager to rearmament, hit it off with Nazi Germany, and the two sides reached a cooperation agreement between China's strategic minerals led by tungsten sand in exchange for German military technical assistance. The "Army Reform Proposal" formulated by the German Advisory Group was adopted by the National Government. By the time of the Outbreak of the July Seventh Incident in 1937, with the help of the German Advisory Group, the Nationalist Government had completed the reorganization of 35 adjustment divisions and 24 finishing divisions, and also readjusted 10 divisions of the Northeast Army, 10 divisions of the Guangdong Army, 26 divisions of the Chuankang Army, and 9 independent brigades.
The picture shows the German troops trained and equipped for China before the outbreak of the all-out War of Resistance.
Not only that, but a large number of German-made arms also took the opportunity of Sino-German military cooperation to pour into China. In 1934, only one Sino-German arms deal worth 15 million silver dollars included 24 German-made FH-18 15 cm field heavy artillery, 20 German-made Pak35/36 37 mm anti-aircraft guns, thousands of Mauser 24 rifles, thousands of Czech-made ZB-26 light machine guns and 20 mm anti-aircraft machine guns produced by the Swiss company Origen, in addition to a large number of Siemens communication equipment, ZEISS telescopes, German light tanks, bridge equipment, anti-aircraft searchlights and other equipment. In 1936, Germany shipped 23 million marks worth of arms to China. In 1937, Germany shipped 82 million marks of munitions to China, including 150 mm fortress guns, anti-aircraft guns, rifles, machine guns, mortars, heavy machine guns, a large number of various ammunition, steel helmets, as well as 240 torpedoes, several speed boats, as well as steelmaking, coking, chemical, ordnance production machinery and other equipment.
At the beginning of the All-out War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, these Chinese troops trained by the German side and a large number of German-made munitions became the backbone. Although the actual battlefield performance of those "German helmets" personally trained by German advisers was not satisfactory, and they were unable to reverse the passive situation caused by a series of political and strategic mistakes made by the Nationalist government, without these troops and German-made arms, China's situation in the early stage of the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression might have been even more difficult.
The picture shows one of the german advisory groups with the best relations with Chiang Kai-shek, General Hans von Seckert.
At the beginning of 1938, in order to supplement the attrition of the "Battle of Songhu", the Nationalist government sent special personnel in Hong Kong to negotiate an emergency purchase of weapons with the German side, including: 300,000 rifles (1,000 rounds per round), 30,000 pistols (1,000 rounds per round), 20,000 machine guns (10,000 rounds per round), 500 37 mm anti-aircraft guns (each with 1,000 rounds of ammunition), and 500 mortars (2,000 rounds per round).
In March 1938, Chiang Kai-shek ordered the commissioners stationed in Germany to purchase a batch of weapons, including: 300 mortars (each with 3,000 rounds), 20,000 shell guns (2,000 rounds per possession), 300 anti-aircraft guns (5,000 rounds per bullet), 6,000 rounds of 150 mm shells, 18,000 rounds of miscellaneous shells, 37 million rounds of rifle ammunition, and a batch of mines.
Statistics show that from July 1937 to July 1938, in a year, the Nationalist government actually obtained from Germany 12 aircraft, 36 105 mm howitzers, 800 mortars, 500 37 mm anti-aircraft guns, 300 13.2 mm anti-aircraft machine guns, 10,000 machine guns, 50,000 rifles, 20,000 barge guns, 4,400 pistols, 6,000 150 mm shells, 36,000 105 mm shells, 1.9 million mortar shells, 500,000 rounds of 37 mm anti-aircraft shells and 160 million rounds of ammunition.
[Note: In the first year of the All-out War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, the amount of arms that China actually received from Germany was slightly different from different sources. However, it is not controversial that these arms were successively transported from German cargo ships to Hong Kong and then transferred to the mainland, playing an important role in the strategic defense stage of the all-out War of Resistance. 】
However, Germany's help to the Chinese War of Resistance ended there.
With the signing of the anti-communist agreement between Germany, Italy and Japan in November 1937, coupled with the fact that Spanish tungsten ore production increased significantly with the end of the civil war, Hitler had enough sources of tungsten ore, and the value of Chinese tungsten sand had become increasingly inferior to the broader interests between Germany and Japan. It can be said that the end of the Spanish Civil War was an important reason why Hitler abandoned his "friendship" with China. As a result, Germany cut off its arms supply to China from May 1938 and recalled the advisory group. By July 1, 1941, with Germany's recognition of the puppet regime of Wang Jingwei in Nanjing, the Nationalist government announced that it had severed diplomatic relations with Germany. After the "Pearl Harbor incident" in 1941, the Nationalist government "declared war" on Germany.