The Nankou War of Resistance was a large-scale battle between the Kuomintang troops and the Japanese in the early days of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, and although the influence of this battle was not as great as the Battle of Songhu or the Battle of Xuzhou, it played the prestige of the Chinese army. In this battle, Tang Enbo, commander of the Kuomintang 13th Army, can be said to be brilliant, he not only led his troops to severely damage the Japanese army, but also broke the delusion of the Japanese army's base camp to destroy China within three months.
After the outbreak of the July 7 Incident, the Japanese army successively occupied Beiping and Tianjin, in order to destroy China, the Japanese army base camp formulated a plan to occupy North China. In August 1937, the Japanese East China Front launched a campaign to invade Shanghai, in order to respond to the East China Japanese army, the North China Japanese army stationed in Beiping and Tianjin planned to expand the results along the three railway lines of Jinpu, Pinghan and Pingsui. The south entrance is the main traffic route of the Pingsui Railway Line, and it is also the passage for the Japanese army to invade and occupy Shanxi and Suiyuan in China. In order to prevent the Japanese army from invading Shanxi, the Nationalist government ordered the 13th Army stationed in Southern Hebei to resist the invading enemy, so the Chinese and Japanese armies fought fiercely at Nankou.
Tombaugh
Tang Enbo's Thirteenth Army belonged to the Second Theater of operations of the Nationalist government, and the generals of this unit were all from the Huangpu clan, they were well-equipped, good at fighting vicious battles and hard battles. In order to prevent the Japanese army from invading Shanxi, Tang Enbo immediately ordered his troops to enter the south entrance. According to the japanese offensive route, the Second Theater Command also made overall arrangements, and commander Yan Xishan urgently dispatched the Thirteenth Army to garrison Nankou, and served as a frontal defense with the Thirteenth Army and the Seventeenth Army. In order to respond to Tang Enbo's troops, Yan Xishan also ordered Liu Ruming's troops of the Northwest Army and Fu Zuoyi's troops of the 35th Army of the Jin Sui Army to go to Zhangjiakou and Chicheng along the Pingsui Railway to make arrangements.
Before the Battle of Nankou, the Chinese and Japanese armies were already fighting, and on the eve of the war, the elite Fifth Division of the Japanese Army and the independent mixed 11th Brigade regiment had already moved south along the Pingsui Line railway, and the Japanese army was very arrogant along this road. They carried Yu Wei, who occupied Beiping and Tianjin, and did not pay any attention to the Kuomintang 13th Army at all. Due to the rapid progress of the Itagaki Fifth Division, in order to prevent the Fifth Division from falling into a heavy siege, the Japanese North China Front mobilized a part of the Japanese army from the Kwantung Army stationed in Chahar to form the Chahar Corps, with Hideki Tojo as the commander-in-chief, and marched west along the Pingsui Line to threaten the capital of Suiyuan Province. The two Japanese armies were horns at each other, and the south entrance had become the focus of the war zone.
The south mouth is located at the junction of the Yanshan Mountains and the Taihang Mountains, and the terrain in this area is complex, which is very suitable for the defense of the Kuomintang army. To the west from Nankou Is Shanxi Province, while to the east is Hebei Province. From the south entrance to Zhangjiakou, there is a pass in the middle, which is the Juyong Pass, which is known as the world's dangerous pass. Around Juyongguan, the mountains are undulating, and these large and small Tukan mountains also stretch all the way to the foot of Yanshan Mountain in Nankou Town, and the Pingsui Railway runs through the foot of Yanshan Mountain, so it became the first target of the Japanese army.
Map of the situation at the Battle of Nankou
Before the outbreak of the Battle of Nankou, the Chinese and Japanese armies fought fiercely on the front line of the Gubeikou of the Great Wall, when the famous general Guan Linzheng could be described as a great glory. Nankou Town is located between the Inner and Outer Great Wall, and from the South Entrance to the foot of the Great Wall Pass, only a sheep intestine trail can pass through. This trail was the logistical artery of the Kuomintang Thirteenth Army, and through this trail, the Thirteenth Army was able to make contact with the Chinese defenders on the outskirts of Nankou.
On August 7, 1937, the Japanese Fifth Division began to attack the south entrance. Itagaki Seishiro, commander of the Fifth Division of the Japanese Army, was a famous Chinese general within the Japanese army, and he was stationed in the northeast of China for a long time before the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, and the puppet state of Manchukuo was concocted by him. In the face of resistance from the Thirteenth Army, Itagaki Seishiro was very arrogant and constantly ordered his troops to attack our positions. In order to weaken the combat effectiveness of our army, Itagaki Seishiro even did not hesitate to release poison gas bombs.
The Japanese Fifth Division, under the cover of aircraft and tanks, continued to launch surprise attacks on our army, because the enemy was well equipped, and our Thirteenth Army initially suffered heavy casualties. However, the Thirteenth Army was, after all, an elite unit in the Kuomintang army, and in the face of several enemy attacks, the soldiers of the Thirteenth Army fought bravely. The Kuomintang troops on the outskirts of Nankou Town fought very hard, and under the repeated attacks of the enemy, the soldiers of the Thirteenth Army even engaged in a white-knife battle with the Japanese army. These good boys from the Whampoa Military Academy regarded death as a homecoming on the battlefield, and they killed and wounded a large number of enemies on the outskirts of Nankou Town before they withdrew from the forward position in accordance with the orders of the military headquarters.
The 13th Army and the Japanese Fifth Division fought fiercely for one day, and the Chinese soldiers suffered more than 1,200 casualties, and the Japanese army also paid the price of 1,000 casualties. Although the Japanese eventually took the outer position of Nankou, the bravery of the officers and men of the 13th Army against the Japanese army also impressed Itagaki Seishiro. On August 8, the battle of the Nankou periphery ended, and on the same day, the Japanese mixed 11th Brigade entered the outskirts of Nankou Town, and Itagaki Seishiro sent a small detachment to the outskirts of Nankou to inspect the outskirts of Nankou in order to avoid the unfavorable situation of the Battle of nankou Outer Area again. Itagaki Seishiro found that the victory pass outside the south mouth was the hope of the Japanese army to break through, because the Chinese army garrison at the victory pass was very small and the firepower was weak, so Itagaki Seishiro planned to enter the south mouth castle from the victory pass.
Seishiro Itagaki
At dawn on August 8, the Japanese launched an attack on Deshengkou, this time with more than fifty armored vehicles, under the cover of armored vehicles and tanks, constantly attacking the Chinese garrison at Deshengkou. Since our army did not take precautions in advance, Deshengkou was quickly breached by the Japanese army. After the fall of the Victory Pass, the Japanese army had completely advanced under the South Pass, which put the Thirteenth Army in a situation of being attacked from the belly and back.
The Rapid progress of the Japanese army, Tang Enbo was also unexpected, in order to delay the Japanese attack, Tang Enbo urgently called a meeting of the division commanders of the Thirteenth Army. Tang Enbo believed that the Japanese army had captured the outer position of Nankou and would inevitably attack from the foot of Yanshan Mountain on the west side of Nankou Town, because the terrain there was open and very suitable for the attack of the Japanese armored forces. He immediately decided to mobilize the 89th Division of the 13th Army to defend the west side of Nankou Town, and in order to cheer up the 89th Division, Tang Enbo also issued a deathly order to the division commander Wang Zhonglian: The people were in the position, and the 89th Division needed to fight until the last soldier.
Wang Zhonglian did not disappoint Tang Enbo, and under the command of Wang Zhonglian's division commander, the officers and men of the 89th Division bravely killed the enemy. In the Battle of Nankou Town, more than half of the officers and men of the 89th Division suffered more than half of the casualties, and the Japanese army also paid a heavy price of more than 4,000 casualties. The 89th Division held the Nankou front for two days and two nights, during which the officers and men of the 89th Division also suffered a large number of casualties, and Tang Enbo saw that this strong brigade had completed its defensive purpose, so he ordered the 89th Division to withdraw from the defensive line.
The Japanese invasion of China
On August 16, the Japanese Fifth Division and the Independent Mixed Fifth Brigade entered the Great Wall defense line, and in order to preserve its strength, Tang Enbo ordered the 89th Division to withdraw from the Nankou position, so the town of Nankou fell into the hands of the enemy. Although nankou town fell, the battle of Nankou was not over, and after the officers and men of the Thirteenth Army withdrew from Nankou Town, they followed Tang Enbo's instructions and all were placed on the front line of the Great Wall. The officers and men of the Thirteenth Army, under the command of Chief of Staff Zhang Xuezhong, continued to stubbornly resist the enemy. On the 19th, the Japanese Fifth Division once again launched an attack on the Thirteenth Army, this time Zhang Xuezhong's chief of staff personally came to the front line to command, stubbornly blocking the enemy in the Hengling area, causing great casualties to the Japanese army.
The next day, Fu Zuoyi's reinforcements from the 35th Army reinforced the 13th Army, and the officers and men of the 35th Army joined forces with the 13th Army to resist the enemy. At this critical moment, in order to urge the officers and men of the Thirteenth Army to kill the enemy, Tang Enbo even went to the front line to direct the battle. He divided the thirteenth army defense line into three stubborn areas, so as to fortify and block the enemy, the 21st Division, 89th Division, 4th Division, and 71st Division of the Thirteenth Army, under the command of Chief of Staff Tang Enbo and Zhang Xuezhong, launched a counterattack against the Japanese army, although the counterattack was ultimately ineffective, but it also brought at least a thousand casualties to the Japanese army.
Chinese troops during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression
The Nankou War of Resistance lasted until the 27th, and the Thirteenth Army and the participating units annihilated more than 10,000 enemy troops, but because the Japanese Chahar Corps penetrated deep into the flank of our army, Tang Enbo had to order the Thirteenth Army to withdraw from the battlefield in order to avoid being attacked by the enemy in the abdomen and back. The Battle of Nankou favorably supported the Battle of Songhu, and it also broke to a certain extent the illusion that the Japanese army would destroy China within three months. After the Battle of Nankou, the Japanese army began to invade Shanxi along the Pingsui Road in two ways. Tang Enbo, commander of the Thirteenth Army, was also favored by Chiang Kai-shek for his outstanding performance in the Nankou War of Resistance. After the Battle of Nankou, Tang Enbo was directly promoted to the commander of the Nationalist Twenty Corps.
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