Looking back at the War of Resistance Against Japan, whether it is real historical materials or film and television works that add oil and vinegar, there will be such a picture: the devil enters the village. In the impression of our generation, "devils entering the village" is the Japanese invaders' raiding and sweeping of Rural China, robbing grain and property in the village, wantonly abusing the people, and searching the guerrillas of the Eighth Route Army.
However, in fact, the Japanese army's sweeping behavior in China's rural areas is not static, not only have different characteristics in different periods, but also in the early and late stages of the war, there have been world-wide changes, from the initial frenzied "three-light policy" of killing, burning, and robbing the light, to the final complete abandonment of the occupation of the countryside, and "friendly joint construction" with the local people. Why is the Japanese army so obsessed with "entering the village"? What is the reason for the change in their attitude before and after? The old man in the village said that during the last period of the War of Resistance Against Japan, there were even many low-level Japanese soldiers who came to the village to ask for food.
Picture | Japanese troops entering the village to sweep
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Why did "the devil enter the village" change from sweeping to asking for food? Uncover the real reasons behind the changes in the Japanese army
The smoke of the Second World War spread from Europe to Asia, from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean, and more than 2 billion people from 61 countries and regions were involved. With so many places involved, one thing is recognized around the world:
China's anti-Japanese battlefield was one of the most arduous and tragic battlefields in this war.
Although Japan is a projectile island country, their industrial strength and economic situation are not comparable to the poor and weak China at that time, and Japan's Meiji Restoration and the Qing Dynasty's closed country were implemented on the battlefield
Compared with the Chinese army, the Japanese army has an innate advantage in weapons and equipment and soldiers' combat effectiveness
This is also an important reason for the difficult progress and heavy casualties in the early stage of China's War of Resistance Against Japan.
Pictured| Japan's Meiji Restoration
After the September 18 Incident, the Japanese army invaded Shenyang on a large scale, and then occupied the northeast region of the mainland with great force. On January 28 of the following year, the Japanese army approached Shanghai, and the defenders of Shanghai disobeyed the "will" of the leadership and began to deploy
Songhu Resisted
。 The battle was vast and fierce, and although the Chinese army was defeated in the end, it gave the Japanese invaders a head-on blow and extinguished their arrogance. It was not until July 7, 1937, that the Japanese army used the Lugou Bridge incident as an excuse to officially launch a full-scale war of aggression against China.
Between 1937 and 1939, the Japanese army relied on its strong military strength to occupy most of China's plains and coastal port cities. In order to be able to effectively manage these areas and expand their "colonies", the Japanese army transferred some troops from the front line and carried out a campaign on the land of China."
Policing campaigns
”。 They
In the mainland's north and central China regions, it was administered in chunks, using force to forcibly collect taxes, allowing the Chinese police forces to undertake public security work, conducting enslavement education, and wantonly searching and sweeping up armed forces behind enemy lines, including the Eighth Route Army.
Figure | devils enter the village
After 1939, the Japanese army extended this "law and order strengthening campaign" to the areas they occupied throughout China, and also made all the Chinese people deeply remember a word -
The devil enters the village.
Invading China, the Japanese Kou "ate up"
In fact, not everyone on the Japanese side was in favor of their country launching a full-scale war of aggression against China in 1937, and the leaders of the Japanese Combat Staff Headquarters were in charge
Ishihara Guan'er
Once said: "There is an old saying in China that people's hearts are not enough to swallow elephants, and this is the case in our country.
China is too big, and if we launch a war in a hurry, not only will we not be able to swallow China up, but we will also pay a heavy price for ourselves.
His proposal was that Japan should continue to maintain the "puppet manchukuo", first softening the attitude of the Chinese in a subtle way, and then launching a war to the south, so that the two-pronged approach could better achieve the effect of occupation.
However, the Japanese did not take his advice, and the soldiers and short-sighted ministers could not wait, they felt that their country was strong enough, and they did not need to bother so much to attack China. Therefore, after the July 7 Incident, the Japanese military resolutely sent troops in an all-round way, with the intention of quickly occupying all of China. But it turns out that to be in a high position, Ishihara Guan'er really has real materials, and his view is very correct.
Between 1937 and 1938, the Japanese and Chinese armies fought five major battles, and although they initially seized some of their equipment and personnel advantages, their advantages disappeared after the Battle of Wuhan.
Pictured| The Battle of Wuhan
The Battle of Wuhan lasted for four months, covering most of the four provinces of Anhui, Henan, Hubei and Jiangxi, and was the longest, largest and most annihilated campaign of the Chinese army in the defensive phase of the War of Resistance Against Japan. Although Wuhan was eventually lost, the Chinese army also damaged a full 260,000 troops at the cost of more than 400,000 casualties, which greatly weakened their offensive momentum and made many Japanese soldiers question whether they could defeat China. After this battle,
The elite armor divisions of the main force of the Japanese army suffered heavy losses, the Kwantung Army in the northeast did not dare to move for fear of provoking the Soviet army, and the invading troops in central And North China also had to enter a rest because of continuous fighting.
Fearing that it would be powerless to continue fighting, the Japanese army also changed its former momentum and began to stabilize the front, aiming at the mountainous area of China that it had previously occupied. These occupied areas amounted to millions of square kilometers, and the Japanese army actually only took some major cities. In order to achieve their colonial rule in these areas,
The Japanese military began recruiting troops domestically in order to draw more personnel to the occupied areas for deep management.
Pictured| Japanese troops
After these reserve divisions composed of recruits entered China, they were divided into multiple squads and sent to towns and villages to garrison, which is commonly known as "devils entering the village". The invaders began to operate in the Chinese people, and the Chinese anti-Japanese armed forces behind enemy lines represented by the Eighth Route Army also began their own counterattack journey.
The "public security war" between China and Japan has officially begun.
"Folks, the devils have entered the village"
According to the relevant personnel descriptions and information records,
In fact, the Japanese army has been entering the village since 1937
。 At that time, the Japanese army came in from the northeast and attacked along the railway line all the way, and the northeast region was in all directions, and Hebei, Shandong, Henan, Anhui and other places along the railway line were all damaged, and countless villages were devastated.
In 1938, the Japanese army stopped the large-scale offensive on the frontal battlefield, began to manage its own occupied areas in China, and formed a temporary ruling body in wartime, with local officials, squires and even "two devils" agents as leaders.
The Japanese army did this in the hope that the Chinese would "fight in the nest" inside, and they would like to pick up ready-made bargains in the back, but they still underestimated the determination of the Chinese people to defend the country and expel foreign humiliation, and underestimated us."
The Anti-Japanese National United Front
”。 In 1937, under the instructions of the central leadership, the Eighth Route Army, which had crossed the Yellow River, carried out large-scale sabotage in the areas occupied by the Japanese army with mobile and agile guerrilla tactics, and used its topographical advantages and the support of the common people to launch a surprise attack on the Japanese army, accumulating over time and gradually disintegrating the invaders' high-handed rule over these places.
Pictured| Japanese troops in the occupied area
The eighth route army's course of action was "the countryside encircling the cities" and it has been conscripting troops and grain in the countryside. The Japanese army looked at the military and civilian policy of the Eighth Route Army and made a sound of it, and also "painted the scoop according to the gourd".
Began a large-scale sweep of the anti-Japanese base areas behind enemy lines, focusing on attacking the rural areas cared for by the Eighth Route Army, which is also known as "devils entering the villages"
。 But as invaders, they only saw the people of the village sending things and delivering news to the Eighth Route Army, but they did not see the Eighth Route Army's efforts to the people. The Eighth Route Army will not only produce on its own, but will also help the common people to do farm work and help them repair their houses, and it is by sincerely winning the trust of the people that they have taken the initiative to send grain and money. And what did the Japanese do? They're completely robbed.
According to the recollections of some Japanese veterans who participated in the war of aggression against China, they were at that time
In fact, there are two situations of sweeping, one is "entering the city" and the other is "entering the village"
。 Most of the time they will not take the initiative to do things that endanger the people, because they will stay here for a long time, even for their own quality of life, in order to better complete the combat tasks, they also have to ensure local economic development and social stability. But this part of the Japanese army that entered the village was very different, they had no conditions, they could do whatever they wanted, after all, they entered the village, one was to look for clues of the Eighth Route Army, the other was to replenish some materials for themselves and the troops, and also to find some unhappiness for the Chinese.
Pictured| the Eighth Route Army helped the masses repair houses
However, the Japanese army's sweep into the village was not as perfunctory as in the film and television works, and the Japanese army was stupid and stunned to drill into the encirclement of the Eighth Route Army. In fact
The well-trained Japanese troops did not rush into the village without any preparation, but would make strict arrangements in advance to find out the situation in the village
It was determined that no Eighth Route Army guerrillas were lurking before taking the next step. Usually, they would first select a target, and then select a few clever soldiers to form an advance team, accompanied by Japanese puppet troops or secret agents, into the village to understand the situation. The advance team had two tasks: first, they wanted to determine whether there were any suspicious people in the village and whether they would pose a threat to the large Japanese troops behind them; the second was to have a rough understanding of the number of people in the village, estimate the general economic situation here, and record the topographic distribution. After the inspection, the Japanese army will report the situation of the village to the front commander, who will decide whether to enter the village for sweeping.
After the commander said that they could enter the village, the Japanese army would first drive all the people in the village to an open place, leaving a small team to guard them, and the remaining soldiers would go to the village to grab supplies. whereas
Under normal circumstances, the first target of the Japanese sweep was food
From rice and flour to an egg in the grass on the side of the road, they will not miss anything that can be eaten. Because Japan itself has a small land area, the Japanese army has never eaten so many delicacies on the land of China; another is that their logistics transportation line is too long, and the grain often cannot arrive on time, even if it is the officers above the first, the low-level soldiers are often hungry.
Picture | vegetables swept by the Japanese army
If the Japanese suffered defeat on the side of the Eighth Route Army, or were robbed of food and equipment, they would retaliate against nearby villages
In order to obtain compensation, innocent villagers were robbed of food and livestock, and in severe cases, they would even kill ordinary people to vent their anger, and afterwards they would burn down their houses and poison wells in the village. At this time, the Japanese army would not come to the village under the banner of "goodwill", and generally launched a surprise attack. Worried that the people in the village will communicate with the Eighth Route Army, they will take some villagers as hostages when they leave, and they will also develop some of their own "dog legs" in order to understand the movements of local personnel.
In fact
The Japanese army also learned from their German big brothers
In the second world, the Nazi Germans inflicted great harm on the Soviet Union at the Battle of Moscow and the Battle of the Lezhev Salient: they committed heinous crimes by creating multiple "no man's lands" in the Soviet Union by means of bloody massacres and poisoning. When the two fascists killed innocent people, they did not think that their evil deeds were actually further accelerating their own demise.
Pictured| Japanese burn down villages
Sweeping into the village becomes going into the village to ask for food
Between 1939 and 1943, the Japanese army committed numerous crimes in the countryside of the occupied areas for the purpose of retaliation, and more than 100 horrible massacres were committed, bringing deep disasters to the Chinese people. But
With the changes in the world war situation, the behavior of the Japanese army in the occupied areas has also undergone earth-shaking changes.
In 1941, the international anti-fascist alliance began to formally counterattack, but the ambitious Japanese army did not give up its dream of world domination, but instead sneaked into Pearl Harbor, resulting in it
The Pacific War broke out
。 In order to further expand the battlefield and seize more benefits, the Japanese army sent a large number of manpower and material resources in Southeast Asia, and later carried hard with the US army in the Pacific theater, touching a nose of ash, and the elite troops were damaged by most of them.
In order to stabilize the war situation, the Japanese army pulled the Japanese garrison in North China and the Kwantung Army in China to fill the vacancy.
Pictured| Pacific War
With insufficient manpower, Japan once again recruited troops at home. However, there were not many people in a small island country, so the quality of soldiers in the later Japanese army was seriously reduced, and the old, weak, sick and disabled abounded.
These mixed recruits were sent to China to continue their previous "sweeping" mission in the occupied territories.
The Japanese army lost all the invading land since 1894 after the defeat in the Pacific War, and was also under the military control of the US military and cut off the naval transport line. Originally, young and middle-aged people were sent to the battlefield, and certain problems had already arisen in Japan's domestic people's livelihood construction and social development, relying entirely on foreign colonies to "feed back." At this time, the goods on the sea could not be transported, and the only foreign trade routes were the Sino-Indian air route and a road to the Soviet Union. The people of Japan are exhausted and complaining, and the ruling class is in danger.
The local people all tightened their pants and belts to live a life, and the days of the invading Japanese army in China, which lacked clothes and food, were even more difficult.
The picture | japanese logistics unit
Relevant historical records,
After 1943, the Japanese troops in the Chinese-occupied areas had changed their attitudes and put away their former minions.
The Japanese defenders stationed in various places began to pay attention to good relations with the local people, and sometimes when they encountered the armed forces behind the enemy lines, they would turn a blind eye, just hoping that everyone would be safe and sound, and they could survive safely. In some places, the Japanese army was forced to survive and traded with the guerrillas behind enemy lines, exchanging weapons and ammunition for food and supplies. After all, for these low-level Japanese soldiers in a foreign country, the honor of the country is important, but whether they can fill their stomachs is even more important.
After 1944, the Japanese army was completely defeated by the US army, completely lost control of the sea in the western Pacific, the Southeast Asian colonies could not transport supplies north, and the logistics gap at home and abroad was getting bigger and bigger. Burned
The Japanese military proposed the "Mainland Opening Up Operation" and launched the "Battle of Yuxianggui" on the mainland, with the intention of occupying southern China and then using the Burma Road as their land logistics transportation route.
In order to realize its plan, Japan once again recruited 400,000 troops and marched south to attack China. This time
A large part of these 400,000 miles are "baby soldiers", and some of them are ordinary Japanese people who have been forcibly recruited.
Interested friends can look at xiaobian's previous articles on the Battle of Tengchong and the Battle of Xiangxi, which occurred during this period. The Japanese army painstakingly planned for the "Battle of Yuxianggui", but did not expect that although this time although it had captured a lot of territory, it still failed to open up its own "land communication line", but was bitten by the Chinese people who rose up to resist, and the blood flowed.
In vain, a large amount of war resources were consumed
The gaps in troop strength, weapons and ammunition, and logistics and food supplies have been widened.
After that, the Japanese invaders who had no soldiers and no resources were even more "picking up their tails to live their lives" in the occupied areas of China, and some Japanese soldiers stationed in the local areas were really hungry and wanted to go to the village to "sweep" something, but because they did not have enough ammunition in their hands, they were driven out by the guerrillas of the Eighth Route Army and the villagers who had prepared earlier. other
Some Japanese soldiers have long since lost their minds to fight, and on weekdays, they rely on helping the villagers to do farm work in exchange for food, and even take off their military uniforms to ask for food in the village when they are anxious
The saying that "the devil wants food" also comes from here.
Pictured| Japanese army doing farm work
However, these Japanese soldiers who came to the Chinese battlefield at the end of the War of Resistance Against Japan were lucky, because they saw that many of them were old, weak, sick and disabled, and the Chinese people were not too embarrassed about them, and they also saved their lives; and their comrades in the Pacific Theater, because they were cut off from logistical supplies by the US army, ate raw fish first and finally ate corpses directly when the grain and grass were exhausted.
After the Japanese army officially announced its surrender in 1945, although the Japanese army in North China was yellow and thin, most of them returned to their hometowns alive
In the last part of the memoirs, some of them paid tribute to the Chinese people, thanked them for their forgiveness and shook their determination to defend the country.
summary
Xiaobian once saw someone put forward the assumption that if the Japanese army did not directly launch the war at the beginning, nor did it adopt a bloody three-light policy in the process of aggression, but absorbed ishihara's opinion, and first used the Huairou policy to soften the attitude of the Chinese, just like the slogan they once put forward , "Establish a Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere", really
In the occupied areas, will our anti-Japanese struggle be more difficult?
Photo | Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Pose Photo
No one can draw conclusions about anything that has not happened in history, but this hypothesis is not valid in the first place. The Japanese army's war of aggression against China was only part of their plan to conquer the world, which can be seen from their performance in World War II, even if the army has been pinned down in the Chinese battlefield, they still have to continue to recruit troops at home, attack Southeast Asia, attack Britain and the United States, and seize more colonies. The reason why Japan chose to invade China at the beginning is only that
Seeing That China is rich in land and resources, he wants to quickly grab resources from China and then use these resources to attack other countries.
If Japan only invaded China and the goal of the battle was only to annex China, then it could adopt this policy of gentleness, buy people's hearts and minds, and "unite" the masses in the same way that they supported the puppet state of Manchukuo in the northeast. But the ambitions of the Japanese invaders were not so small.
Such an approach is too slow for them
The Japanese army's initial plan was to "occupy China in three months", they just wanted to use China as their material rear, and use this place as a base to further compete with the world and become the world hegemon.
Figure | victory in the War of Resistance Against Japan
Japan's war of aggression against China was essentially about plunder.
Therefore, the moment the Japanese invaders set foot on Chinese soil, Chinese and the Japanese were doomed to have one party completely surrender to this land. Fortunately, we won. Beginning with the Lugou Bridge Incident, in the fourteen years of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, tens of millions of Chinese sons and daughters stood up, countless Chinese soldiers began to fight in bloody battles, and the Japanese invaders who were once extremely ambitious and arrogant were run away by the Chinese army, and a new chapter in history was opened.