One of the most dangerous neighbors of the Soviet Union was the Empire of Japan. However, this state was decidedly dangerous for all its neighbors. In the case of the USSR, memories of the Russian-Japanese war, the intervention during the Civil War (the Japanese evacuated northern Sakhalin only in 1925, having discussed the withdrawal of their troops under numerous conditions), and ideological considerations also played a role. In 1928, a campaign to persecute the Japanese Communist Party began. About 1600 people were arrested on suspicion of belonging to the party, almost 500 of them were subjected to various kinds of punishment. In the 1920s, Japan outwardly adhered to a course of cooperation with old allies - Great Britain and the United States - and, it seemed, refrained from military action. To a large extent, this peacefulness was also facilitated by the country's difficult financial situation - since 1924, its budgets were reduced with a significant deficit (306 million yen). However, the amount of this deficit tended to decrease - by 1934 this figure had dropped to 7 million yen, and in 1933 the empire was able to obtain a positive budget balance. These were difficult years for the Japanese economy. The 1929 crisis took its toll on her. The government was forced to suspend the free exchange of paper money for gold. Nonetheless, measures aimed at substantial public savings resulted in Tokyo returning to the gold standard on January 11, 1930. On February 15, 1930, the government lifted the embargo on the export of the gold coin. Its leak (230 million yen against the expected 100-120 million) led to a drop in prices for Japanese goods.
Prices for rice fell by 45%, for vegetables and fruits - by 50-52%, for silk cocoons - by 48-62%. Falling prices for rice and silk led to a massive ruin of farmers, in 1930 there were about 1 million unemployed in the country. Of the 569,432 workers who lost their jobs in 1931, 211,990 returned to the village, making the situation much more difficult. The drop in demand for silk in the international market was especially painful. Silk accounted for 30% of Japan's exports. Silk exports fell by 46.8%, textiles - 34%. China (28%) occupied the first place in Japan's total exports, significantly surpassing the UK (2.5%) and the USA (2.7%). 96% of all Japanese overseas investment also went to China. In this country, the empire was forced to enter into competition with the United States. America from 1913 to 1931 increased its investment in Manchuria 80 times,Japan over the same years - only 5 times, in the rest of China, American investments over the same years grew 8 times, Japanese - 4 times. In 1930, the empire's exports and imports decreased by 31% and 30% in relation to 1929, and in 1931 - by 22% and 21% in relation to the 1930 level. The cost of exporting paper fabrics in 1929 was 108 million yen, and in 1931 - 39 million yen. Tokyo managed to maintain a positive trade balance with China, but it fell from 120 million to 22 million yen. Tokyo managed to maintain a positive trade balance with China, but it fell from 120 million to 22 million yen. Tokyo managed to maintain a positive trade balance with China, but it fell from 120 million to 22 million yen.
The crisis trends in the economy coincided with important actions in foreign policy, which were perceived by the right as serious concessions. From January 21 to April 22, 1930, a conference on the regulation of naval development was held in London. It was attended by five maritime powers - the United States, Great Britain, Japan, France and Italy. From the very beginning, there were fundamental differences between France, Italy, Great Britain, and the United States. As a result, on April 22, 1930, only representatives of London, Washington and Tokyo signed the agreement. It was an agreement on the limitation of naval armaments, according to which the ratio of the Japanese and British fleets was determined as 6 to 10. The total tonnage of British cruisers was 339 thousand tons, American - 323 thousand tons, Japanese - 209 thousand tons, destroyers - 150 thous.tons from the British and Americans and 105 thousand tons from the Japanese, the submarine tonnage was the same - 52.7 thousand tons. The Japanese press almost unanimously welcomed the agreement, which made it possible to achieve the significant cost savings so needed during the crisis. Only on the cruising program for the year it was supposed to be about 100 million yen.
However, not everyone was happy. One of the leaders of the militarists, Admiral Kato Kanji, tried to put pressure on the emperor in order to strengthen the naval programs. In 1930, the country widely celebrated the 25th anniversary of the victory in the Russo-Japanese War, which further inflamed the mood of the radicals. The intelligence department of the headquarters of the Kwantung Army hastened preparations for the operation to seize Manchuria. In the summer and fall, large-scale maneuvers were carried out under the leadership of the emperor. The navy, army, aviation took part in them. Against the background of the economic crisis, a wave of criticism of Western influence, liberalism, the search for Freemasons, etc., unfolded. On November 14, 1930, a right-wing extremist severely wounded Prime Minister Hamaguchi Osachi with a pistol. He died a few months later. The new cabinet was more inclined to make concessions to the military. Right-wing organizations in the army conspired and attempted a coup d'état in March and October 1931. These attempts failed; the participants in the conspiracy were sent to distant garrisons under plausible pretexts. The military compensated for this failure by organizing a successful performance in Manchuria.
In 1930, about 30 million people already lived here, of which only 230 thousand were Japanese, half of whom lived in the Kwantung region. In June 1931, the Chinese military authorities detained Captain Shintaro Nakamura and an accompanying group of a retired Japanese army sergeant, a Mongol guide and a Russian translator. All were executed on charges of espionage and drug trafficking. The investigation into the incident dragged on, sparking outrage among the officers of the Kwantung Army. On September 17, 1931, the emperor gave an order to bring the army into combat readiness. General Kenji again provided general guidance and training. His subordinates Colonel Itagaki Seichiro [1], Lieutenant Colonel Ichihara Kanji and Major Hanaya Tadashi simulated an attack on the Japanese railway line near Mukden. It was over 1100 km long.with the width of the extraterritorial territory belonging to the road administration, not less than 62 m. On the night of September 18, 1931, a Japanese patrol under the command of Lieutenant Suemori Kamomot was fired upon by a group of Chinese soldiers. The battle began, as a result, according to the report of the Japanese officer, a piece of rail about a meter long was blown up. This became the basis for the invasion of Manchuria.
The offensive of the Japanese infantry in Manchuria. November 4, 1931.
The Japanese forces here were relatively small. They were based on the 2nd Infantry Division under the command of General - L. Tamono Jiro (two brigades), reinforced by a cavalry, artillery regiments, a battalion and a sapper company, a signal unit. Together with the road guard, gendarmes and the Kwantun garrison, this amounted to no more than 10.4 thousand people. Marshal Zhang Xue-liang, who ruled the province, had about 250 thousand regular and about 80 thousand irregular troops, but the main forces were concentrated in the Peking area. There were from 3 to 5 brigades in Manchuria, stretched out along the railway and the Korean border. The superiority in numbers still remained with the Chinese. The Japanese proceeded from the fact that with such a balance of forces, only an offensive could help them. The very next day after the incident, the most important stations Mukden and Changchun were in the hands of the Japanese.
Japanese attacks were sudden, but on several occasions the Chinese garrisons offered stubborn resistance. The widespread use of aviation and armored vehicles by the Japanese was of great importance. Only the resistance of the partisans was noticeable, although it was spontaneous and did not have a central leadership. In fact, these were peasant detachments, poorly armed and almost untrained, operating in their regions. The main forces of Zhang Xue-liang began to retreat towards Beijing.
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During this time, Chiang Kai-shek's government expanded its contacts with the West. In 1930, about 4,500 advisers from the USA, Great Britain, France, Germany and Italy served in the headquarters and directorates of the Chinese army. Chiang Kai-shek threw all his forces into fighting the Chinese Red Army and the "Soviet regions" under its control. From November 1930 to September 1931, the Kuomintang government organized three campaigns against the Red Army, and all three ended in failure. Nanking was not up to organizing the struggle against the Japanese.
In Manchuria, a commission of the League of Nations worked under the leadership of Lord Victor Lytton. She found that the damage to the railway was so negligible (if at all) that after 15-20 minutes a fast train to Changchun passed through the damaged section on schedule. These findings are all the more surprising since at first they could not even show Lytton the place of the explosion. The officers of the Kwantung Army headquarters forgot him. The commission worked under the control of the Japanese, who did not admit unwanted persons to Lytton. He even called the resistance of the Chinese banditry. But the fake with the attack on the South Caucasus Railway was so obvious and so crude that it can certainly be argued that the Japanese authorities were not very concerned about finding a reason for their aggression. After the war, at the Tokyo Tribunal, the Japanese military recognized the planned nature of the propaganda, and the documents of the Lytton Commission,claiming that there can be no talk of any self-defense of the Japanese side, were included in the basis of the documents of the prosecution. Of course, in 1931, this evidence was ignored. Of course, in 1931, Tokyo's official version was that Japan did not want this conflict and did not prepare for it.
Arrival of the Victor Lytton Commission in Shanghai. 1932.
This version was announced by the government of the island empire on September 24, 1931. Responsibility for the incident was attributed to the Chinese authorities, which were constantly engaged in provocations and anti-Japanese propaganda, which endangered the lives and property of Mikado citizens in Northeast China. After the disarmament of the Chinese garrisons, according to Tokyo, "the maintenance of peace and public order was entrusted to the peaceful Chinese organizations, under the supervision of Japanese troops." Naturally, soon one of the reasons for the offensive, Tokyo announced the need to fight the "Chinese red partisans" and the Korean communists, who acted relying on their supposedly existing bases in Blagoveshchensk.
On December 31, 1931, People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs M. M. Litvinov, at a meeting with his Japanese counterpart Kenkichi Yoshizawa, raised the issue of the state of Soviet-Japanese relations. The minister was in Moscow on his way from Paris to Tokyo. The People's Commissariat for Foreign Affairs announced the desire of the Soviet government to build a system of non-aggression treaties along the entire perimeter of the USSR's borders, about ongoing negotiations with neighbors with whom such agreements have not yet been concluded. He proposed to conclude such an agreement with Japan. Litvinov understood that Yoshizawa could not give an answer immediately, without consulting his cabinet colleagues, and offered to discuss this issue upon his return. The Japanese diplomat preferred to avoid continuing the conversation on this topic. Tokyo ignored the Soviet government's proposal. On January 9, 1932, the plenipotentiary of the USSR in Japan, at a meeting with representatives of the local press, said that "the creation of a conflict between us and Japan depends entirely on the latter."
The hostilities in Manchuria dragged on. At first, the Japanese simply did not have the strength to move north. After short fighting on February 5, 1932, they occupied Harbin. Again the case was decided by armored vehicles and aircraft. The Chinese suffered heavy losses and retreated north. On December 4-5, 1932, the remnants of the Chinese troops, pressed against the Soviet border near the Otpor station of the Chita region, crossed it, where they were disarmed and interned. There were already a few of them - for 4009 people who crossed the Soviet border, there were 2400 soldiers, 11 generals, 369 officers and 18 warrant officers. The rest were civilians. The Japanese demanded the extradition of the Chinese military, which was followed by a categorical refusal. Soon about 9 thousand more people crossed the border. It was decided to send the military to Xinjiang, and civilians to Vladivostok,and further to the central part of China. Only after these events, on December 12, 1932, the Soviet Union and China restored diplomatic relations, which were interrupted in 1929, in full.
MM Litvinov, MI Kalinin and the Ambassador of the Republic of China to the USSR Yan Tse. 1938.
After the end of the occupation of Manchuria, the Japanese became even more convinced of their impunity. Not surprisingly, after this, the number of border clashes increased sharply, not only on the border of the USSR with Manchuria, but also in Primorye and even Kamchatka. Japanese warships systematically violated the sea border and covered fishing fleets that were poaching in Soviet waters. Japanese destroyers in groups of 3-4 deliberately invaded the territorial waters. The Japanese military fired at Soviet territory, the Japanese aircraft invaded our airspace. Japanese pilots flew around Soviet border towns and villages in broad daylight. All this did not in any way indicate Tokyo's desire to establish good-neighborly relations.
As for the notorious bases of the "red partisans", they were clearly absent in Shanghai, but in January 1932, the most difficult battles began here. A city with a population of about 3.5 million, located at the mouth of the Yangtze River, was the center of trade in China's most important region with a population of 200 million. Japanese investment here totaled 270 million yen. Under the influence of news from Manchuria, opponents of Japan intensified in Shanghai. The Anti-Japanese Society of Japanese Enterprise Workers, which brought together up to 80,000 people, began a boycott of Japanese factories. Japanese industrialists, with high unemployment rates, could not hire workers even for double wages. On the evening of January 18, a group of young people attacked two Japanese Buddhist monks, one of them was crippled, the other later died from beatings. The city police got involvedwhich opened fire - 2 of the attackers were wounded and 2 killed. On January 21, the Japanese Consul General sent a note to the mayor of the city demanding the dissolution of anti-Japanese organizations and punishing those responsible. The tension only grew. On January 23, a Japanese cruiser and 4 destroyers approached the city, on January 24 - 2 aircraft carriers. On January 26, at 23:00, Rear Admiral Koichi Shozawa presented the Chinese authorities with an ultimatum - at 24 to accept the demands set out in the January 21 note.set out in the January 21st note.set out in the January 21st note.
The mayor almost immediately accepted the demands, but already at midnight, Shozawa took action. About 2,000 marines landed in the city. The townspeople began to resist, and, contrary to the order from Nanjing, they were supported by the garrison, and then, after the conclusion of an armistice on January 30, which was practically not observed, and the 19th Chinese army, which was stationed in the area of the city. Heavy fighting began in the streets of the city, in the area of the central railway station, in the Chapei area and under the city, near the fortified area of Usun. The Japanese actively used armored vehicles, tanks and artillery. The Chinese air force was small, the Japanese quickly seized air superiority and began bombing the city. Nevertheless, they failed to break through the defenses of the 19th Army and the volunteer detachments. Both sides have steadily increased the presence of their military forces. As a result, in mid-February 1932, about 30 thousand people, 120-140 aircraft and 20 tanks and armored vehicles each participated in the battles of the Japanese. Another truce was signed until February 20. The Chinese used it to bring up the 5th Army to the city, the Japanese - the 9th Infantry Division. During the fighting on March 3-5, the Japanese landed a landing in the rear of the Chinese army, and under the threat of encirclement, it began to withdraw from Shanghai. The Chinese fiercely resisted and often launched counter-attacks. The final truce was signed only on May 5, after which the Japanese withdrew their troops from the city. It was a huge success for the Chinese army, which was painfully perceived in Japan.to bring up the 5th Army to the city, the Japanese - the 9th Infantry Division. During the fighting on March 3-5, the Japanese landed a landing in the rear of the Chinese army, and under the threat of encirclement, it began to withdraw from Shanghai. The Chinese fiercely resisted and often launched counter-attacks. The final truce was signed only on May 5, after which the Japanese withdrew their troops from the city. It was a huge success for the Chinese army, which was painfully perceived in Japan.to bring up the 5th Army to the city, the Japanese - the 9th Infantry Division. During the fighting on March 3-5, the Japanese landed a landing in the rear of the Chinese army, and under the threat of encirclement, it began to withdraw from Shanghai. The Chinese fiercely resisted and often launched counter-attacks. The final truce was signed only on May 5, after which the Japanese withdrew their troops from the city. It was a huge success for the Chinese army, which was painfully perceived in Japan.
Partisan resistance was very active, especially in the northern part of Manchuria. Obviously, it was this, and not Japan's unpreparedness and the presence of a communist threat, that was the reason that the Japanese army occupied Manchuria for only 5-6 months. It was a huge and very important territory for the Chinese economy. The three northeastern provinces accounted for 93% of this country's oil production, 79% of iron smelting, 55% of gold production, 37% of iron ore reserves, 23% of electricity production, etc. However, this was only the beginning. As a contemporary correctly noted, "… the Manchurian operation is only the first stage in the struggle for the complete partition of China …" The opportunities for this were quite good. Yet ultranationalists in the Japanese army were still unhappy. On May 15, 1932, a group of officers killed Prime Minister Tsuyoshi Inukai, who did not support (or did not actively support) the aggression against China. The conspirators were punished. But Japan's domestic policy was still far from stable.
[1] Executed for war crimes by the Tokyo Tribunal in 1948
[2] Fists and landlords
OLEG AYRAPETOV
