The Kwantung Army Daisaku Kawamoto carried out the Huanggutun explosion

The plan to send troops to Jinzhou to disarm the Fengjun failed, and the commander of the Kwantung Army, Muraoka, who had not long been in office, was determined to get rid of Zhang Zuolin, create chaos, and take the opportunity to solve the Fengjun army and realize Japan's armed occupation of the whole northeast.

Muraoka's assassination of Zhang Zuolin was planned in extreme secrecy, and even Saito, chief of staff of the Kwantung Army, and Daisaku Kawamoto, a senior staff officer, did not know about it in advance. Muraoka secretly contacted through the legation in China, Kenkawa Miji. On May 31, 1928, Muraoka secretly ordered Takeshita Yoshiharu, who was stationed in Harbin Martial Arts Museum, to go to Beijing to assassinate Zhang Zuolin.

Muraoka's assassination plan was learned by Daisaku Kawamoto, who immediately approached Takeshita and said, "It's better not to do anything that is useless." What if it fails? In North China, is there really someone who can be trusted to complete such a bold strategy? Very uneasy. In the event that the plan to end with personal responsibility without holding the responsibility of the state and the military is not possible, then the nations must think that it is very good and do not know how to take the opportunity to accuse.

Let me do it! There is no other way. If you go to North China, you have to go to Beijing to reconnoiter Zhang Zuolin's activities in detail, such as escaping by train outside the customs on a few months and days, just inform me of these reconnaissance. Daisaku Kawamoto took over the "mission" of assassinating Zhang Zuolin.

It seems that Daisaku Kawamoto had ambitions to kill Zhang Zuolin in December 1927. In early 1928, he conspired with Captain Mamoru Kawagoe and Nakano, the leader of the Northern Manchurian bandits, to blow up two iron bridges on the eastern and western lines of the Eastern Branch Railway twice in succession. This is a far-reaching experiment. Their aim was to see the repercussions in China, the Soviet Union, and Japan. Sure enough, the day after the railway was bombed, newspapers in various countries reported it.

These newspapers generally believed that the Eastern Railway Bridge was bombed by Zhang Zuoxiang or White Russians in Harbin to oppose Zhang Zuolin, and that the Western Railway Bridge was done by Wu Junsheng of Qiqihar. Not a single newspaper doubted the Japanese or the Japanese army. This situation made Heben and others realize that there was no shortage of people who opposed Zhang Zuolin, so even if they killed Zhang Zuolin and blamed Chinese, it was not an impossible thing.

Kawamoto had always wanted to create an excuse for the Kwantung Army to solve the Northeast Army's armed forces by murdering Zhang Zuolin, and thought that it must be done secretly, so he persuaded Takeshita Yoshikasa, who had leaked the military headquarters of Muraoka's plan to him, to communicate his explosive plan to the military attache of Jiankawa. Kawamoto reported the plan to Saito, chief of staff of the Kwantung Army, with the tacit approval of Commander Muraoka. The steps envisaged by Kawamoto were: first get rid of Zhang Zuolin, then turn the power of the three eastern provinces into local warlords, then disturb the peace, and finally dispatch the Kwantung Army.

"You must kill the leader, see through that there is no solution to the Manchurian problem other than this." Just kill Zhang Zuolin. "But where?" In what way?

At first, after research, Kawamoto and others believed that only the Juliu River Iron Bridge in Mukden was the most ideal location. So he sent the leader of the sapper squadron to reconnoiter the situation in detail, and found that the Fengjun army was very closely guarded, and it would take at least a week or so to prepare there. It was impossible to avoid the strict vigilance of the Fengjun army in any case.

Later, the place where Zhang Zuolin was killed was set at the intersection of the Southern Manchurian Line and the Jingfeng Line - Huanggutun. Kawamoto believes that in doing this, it is necessary to choose a place where it can be carried out more freely. And here is the intersection of two railway lines, the South Manchurian Line is on the bridge, the Keifeng Line is under the bridge, and the Japanese walk around a little, and it will not attract attention.

As for the means of killing Zhang, there may be two types: First, attack the train. 2. Blowing up trains with explosives. With the first method, there must be clear evidence of a Japanese attack; With the second method, it may be possible to do it without leaving a trace. So Kawamoto decided on the second option. In the unlikely event that this blasting plan fails, a plan to derail the train as a second step can be drawn up immediately. And he lost no time in taking advantage of the chaos, allowing the big knife team to rush in and end up with him, and a thoughtful murder plan was formed.

The intelligence personnel sent to Beijing along the route were already in their positions, closely monitoring Zhang Zuolin's movements. The cunning Kawamoto kills people and wants to keep the knife from blood, and he has come up with another plot to try to blame Chinese. Kenzaburo Iten, who was in the coal and talc business at Oishibashi, was an avid militarist who suggested to the Kwantung Army to use drastic methods to open the situation, which coincided with Kawamoto.

Itten was very supportive of Kawamoto's bombing plan, and when Kawamoto revealed that he would need to hire several Chinese to blow up the iron bridge, Itten readily agreed to find a way. Itten took Liu Daiming, a former commander of the cavalry battalion of the Jilin Army, when Liu was a member of the Fengtian Japanese Affiliated Fireworks Lane Investment Anonymous Cooperative.

Liu Daiming hired a total of three people, two of whom were Liu's subordinates, scoundrels and morphine poisoners, and the other surnamed Wang. They were each given 100 to 150 yuan. Early in the morning of June 3, they were given a shower, another haircut, a change into clean clothes, and sent them to Iten. In the meantime, the surname Wang noticed that something was wrong, and took advantage of the fact that the Japanese were not paying attention to it.

Itten and the others said to the remaining two, your mission is to drop bombs on the train and blow it up. And asked them to bring three letters, two of which were Liu Daiming's forged demolition orders from the southern army, and the other was a secret letter written by someone on a note with Ling Yinqing's name. Ling Yinqing was appointed by the Nationalist Government as an envoy to the three provinces of Shandong and Henan, and was active in Manchuria at that time.

After everything was ready, the two men were sent to the staff officer of Heben in Shenyang. Kawamoto took them to the blasting site by car. Captain Tonomiya immediately ordered the Japanese soldiers to stab them to death with bayonets, then stuffed bombs that had been prepared long ago in their arms and dumped their bodies at the scene to cover up the crimes of the Kwantung Army.

"In the roaring explosion, black smoke flew into the sky, reaching a height of two hundred meters..."

When Takeshita Yoshiharu saw that Zhang Zuolin had set off from Beijing, he immediately telegraphed to the Kwantung Army headquarters, reporting that Zhang Zuolin had ordered his fifth lady to depart first on a special train composed of seven carriages, and five or six hours later, Zhang himself was traveling for Mukden. Soon, Captain Yoshio Ishino of Shanhaiguan reported that the Fifth Lady's train had passed through Shanhaiguan. Takeshita and Ishino were specially sent to Beijing and Shanhaiguan to carry out espionage missions.

When Zhang Zuolin's special train passed through Tianjin, Machino Advisor and Pan Fu got off the train. The Tianjin Army Command quickly reported this situation to the Kwantung Army. The special train arrived at Shanhaiguan, and only one or two Japanese garrisons stood guard at the station, their attitude was as usual, and they did not look nervous. Wu Junsheng had already rushed from Mukden to Shanhaiguan Station to greet him, and inserted the carriage he was riding in before Zhang's car. After Wu got into the car, he also met with Zhang and said a few words to each other.

Zhang Zuolin in the train, where does he know what awaits him. As he was heading towards the blasting site little by little, before the special checkout, the entourage was sweating in their hands, worried that something would happen. But as soon as the car came out of Shanhaiguan, everyone felt that they were finally out of danger and returned to their hometown, and they all undressed and slept with confidence. Wu Junsheng played poker with Liu Zhe, Mo Dehui, Chang Yinhuai and others overnight, and only dispersed when he was about to reach Huanggutun.

Who knows, outside Shanhaiguan, the Japanese Kwantung Army has set a death trap. The real danger is coming at people step by step.

Conspiring with Kawamoto is Captain Kawagoe, who once did the blasting "test" together; The specific operation of the blasting was carried out by Captain Donggong. Captain Kawagoe was worried that Donggong had mistakenly blown up the train of the Fifth Lady who was traveling first as Zhang Zuolin's special train, so he hurried to the scene and said to him: "The train that passed at eleven o'clock at midnight was formed by seven yellow cars, and it was the train on which the Fifth Lady was riding. Five or six hours later, the train made of twenty sky-blue carriages was the special train that Zhang Zuolin was riding. ”

Donggong replied, "Got it." Everything is ready. The two Chinese had been killed, their bodies had been left at the scene, and in the arms of one of them a secret letter from the Southern Revolutionary Army had been stuffed, and a Russian-made bomb had been stuffed in his hand, disguising them as if they knew at first glance that the train had been blown up by them. ”

When Kawagoe went back, he specially took a car to circle around Shenyang Station and Fengtian City, and saw that the vigilance of the Chinese sentries was no different from usual, and his face could not help but show a bit of pride. As planned, "riding the night in the dark" was done. Kawagoe discussed with Kawamoto, drove to the scene again, and asked if Donggong Tianliang could do it? Donggong gritted his teeth and said only one word: "The arrow has left the string." ”

In four short words, Kawagoe listened very satisfied. On the way back, he once again inspected Shenyang Station and Fengtian City, and found that the Chinese side was still on guard, so he returned to the Shenyang Pavilion and reported to Kawamoto. Kawamoto said to himself: "The surname Zhang, wait and see!" ”

When the special car passed by Huanggutun, Qi Enming, commander of the Fengtian gendarmerie, came to greet him. After boarding the train, the special car will drive east to Fengtian Station outside Xiaoxibianmen.

At 5:23 a.m. on June 4, the train was passing through the bridge hole of the South Manchuria Railway, when suddenly there were two loud noises like landslides and cracks, and the carriage in which Zhang Zuolin was riding was blown into ruins. Years later, Kawamoto proudly wrote in his memoirs:

"In the roaring explosion, black smoke flew into the sky, reaching a height of two hundred meters. I can only imagine if Zhang Zuolin's bones also flew into the sky? But for this violent black smoke and explosion, even I was very frightened, and I was a little worried. The medicinal power is too great, indeed! ”

That's right, "the medicinal power is too great". The huge destructive power caused by the sudden detonation of nearly 200 kilograms of high explosives is unimaginable to ordinary people. The fact that the Japanese used such vicious means shows how much they hated Zhang Zuolin.

Zhou Dawen, who personally experienced Zhang Zuolin's bombing incident, left a true record of the bombing scene: "... A few minutes later, as I crossed the bridge hole of the South Manchuria Railway, I was looking out of the corridor when I saw two men in yellow uniforms running up the embankment of the South Manchuria Railway from the south. I entered the private room, and before I could sit down, I heard a loud bang, and in an instant there was another noise, even louder than the previous one, before the car stopped, and I was shocked to the ground. When I regained consciousness, I opened my eyes and saw that the car window and the small table in front of the window in the private room had disappeared, and there were shards of glass all over the floor.

At that time, I suspected that I had been injured, but I tried to rotate all my limbs, stood up and touched my body, as usual, there was no pain, only found that the palm of my left hand was bleeding, probably pierced by broken glass. I took out the cloth and cotton wool and wiped the wound, and before I could bandage it, I quickly ran out of the private room. We saw our machine-gun guards in the corridor of the carriage, lining up to strafe north and south for about a few seconds, and after He Fenglin's order to stop firing, the gunfire stopped. When I got out of the car, I was shocked, Zhang Zuolin's chartered car had collapsed in all its carriages, no longer in the shape of a car, and the dining car behind me was the same, and it was still smoking and began to catch fire.

Looking at the low iron wall of the bridge railing on the east side of the South Manchuria Railway Bridge, the low iron wall was blown up to the sky, and the upper half of the eastern pier of the Yangash Bridge was blown up by 1/3. At this time, everyone was busy rushing to the injured personnel. First, I saw Wu Junsheng being put on a leather carriage by several people and heading towards the city (reportedly dead at the time, with a large iron nail pierced into his head). I also saw the Japanese consultant Yi'e with a bloody face and running towards the front of the car. I also saw Mo Dehui carried down from the car and sent to the Fengtian Municipal Hospital outside the gate of Xiaoxi, and Liu Zhe walked with his injuries. At this time, Zhang Zuolin had been carried into a battered car of the commander of the gendarmerie, Qi Enming, and was carried by adjutant Wang Xianwu in the reclining car and returned to the marshal's mansion

Zhang Zuolin, who was seriously injured, was sent back to the marshal's mansion, and everyone panicked, quickly ran out to greet him, and asked the medical officer to carry out emergency treatment. Zhang Zuolin had his sleeves covered in blood, cut his clothes with scissors, found that one arm had been broken, and died soon after at the age of 53.

In fact, more than a decade ago, Zhang Zuolin became the target of murder by some Japanese. At that time, Doi, Koiso, Kawashima and other pro-Soi, Koiso, Kawashima and other pro-sect Su factions headed by the Kanto governor Nakamura opposed the Japanese government's plan to win over Zhang Zuolin, and even made the decision to blow Zhang Zuolin up.

On May 27, 1916, General Nakamura Jue, the governor of the Japanese Kwantung Capital, "visited" Mukden, and Zhang Zuolin led his subordinate Tang Yulin and others to the station in five Russian-style carriages to greet them. But Zhang Zuolin sat in another carriage and survived, but he was also shocked into a cold sweat.

More than a decade ago, Zhang Zuolin narrowly escaped the attack of Japanese bombs; More than a decade later, the Japanese still killed him with 200 pounds of explosives.

Daisaku Kawamoto