On August 8, 1945, the Soviet Union officially acceded to the Potsdam Declaration. On the same day, at 5 pm Moscow time, People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs V.M. Molotov received the Japanese ambassador and informed him that from midnight on August 9, the USSR and Japan were in a state of war.
On August 9, 1945, at about one in the morning Khabarovsk time, the advanced and reconnaissance detachments of the Trans-Baikal, 1st and 2nd Far Eastern Fronts crossed the state border and entered the territory of Manchuria. The Manchurian strategic offensive operation began.
At dawn, the main forces of the fronts went on the offensive. Since the beginning of the operation, she has been actively involved in fighting our attack and bomber aviation. On the first day of the campaign, Soviet air armies launched massive strikes against command posts, headquarters and communication centers of the Japanese group. There were also raids on large railway junctions, military enterprises and enemy airfields. At the same time, the cities of Khalun-Arshan, Hailar, Qiqihar, Solun, Harbin, Changchun, Kirin, and Mukden were attacked. Skillful actions of aviation managed to ensure that communications between the headquarters and subunits of the Japanese troops in Manchuria were already disrupted in the first hours of the operation.
The Pacific Fleet did not lag behind the pilots. On August 9, 1945, its aviation and formations of torpedo boats attacked ships, coastal defense facilities in the North Korean ports of Yuki, Rasin, Seishin.
Thus, the Kwantung Army was attacked on land, from the air and from the sea along the entire length of the border with Manchuria and on the North Korean coast.
At 4:30 am on August 9, the forces of the Trans-Baikal Front began active hostilities in the central (Khingan-Mukden) direction. Without aviation and artillery preparation, the 6th Guards Tank Army crushed the border formations and cover units and launched a swift offensive towards the Bolshoi Khingan ridge. In this area, the advance of Malinovsky's troops ranged from 50 to 120 kilometers. By evening, the advanced units of Kravchenko's army and the Soviet-Mongolian mechanized cavalry group of General Pliev reached the approaches to the Greater Khingan passes.
From the very first days of the operation, it became clear that the conduct of the war by the Japanese was different from European traditions. This concerned, first of all, the presence of units of "suicide bombers" - tank destroyers. They fixed the charge on themselves and rushed under our tanks, blowing them up and themselves.. But their effectiveness was extremely low. For example, when trying to ram tank columns of the 6th Guards tank army 9 Japanese kamikaze planes crashed. However, all these attempts did not cause significant harm to any machine.
It is noteworthy that the Japanese themselves did not always actively use their tanks. In the summary of the generalized combat experience of the troops of the 2nd Far Eastern Front, it is indicated, for example, that the tanks of the enemy army were used only a few times during the entire period of the fighting.
In his memoirs, a participant in the battles in Manchuria guards. Captain D.F. Loza described the attack of the convoy by Japanese suicide pilots as follows: |
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Another distinguishing feature was the organization of defense. The Japanese, despite well-equipped defensive strongholds, nevertheless kept a minimum of troops on them, setting them the task of holding the enemy at the line until the main forces approached. At the same time, they limited themselves not to a continuous line of defense, but to a focal one, believing that the enemy would not be able to overcome difficult terrain and would be forced to attack head-on. But the gaps between the fortified areas were so large that they allowed not only small groups, but even entire mechanized columns to penetrate deep into the defense. In addition, numerous bunkers and bunkers had dead zones that were not blocked by fire, which allowed small groups to get close to them and destroy them with the help of explosions and fire.
The Japanese fought for the defended positions to the last, and in the event of an encirclement or a hopeless situation, the garrisons undermined themselves. However, such resistance was not observed in all sectors of the front.
Noteworthy is the use of pigeons in the Japanese army to indicate the location of enemy troops within the sight distance of birds in flight at an altitude of up to 500 meters. For these purposes, the training of domestic pigeons was practiced. It happened in the following way. When the pigeons were released "for a walk", they were driven outside the front line, into the field, where there were Japanese soldiers dressed in Red Army uniforms. As soon as pigeons appeared over the battle formations of disguised soldiers, the “Red Army men” raised canvases with grain and fed the birds. Repeated training developed in birds conditioned reflex . There were cases when our fighters entered the house, the pigeons chased them and sat on the roof of the house, which was then subjected to artillery fire.
Overcoming difficulties, our armies rapidly pressed the enemy units. At the same time, on the left wing of the front, the 36th Army under the command of General A.A. Luchinsky and the 39th Army under the command of General I.I. Lyudnikov captured the Chzhalainor-Manchurian and Khalun-Arshan fortified regions with a counterattack and advanced almost 40 kilometers deep into Manchuria . On the right wing of the front, the forces of the Mongolian People's Army covered 50 kilometers.
Under the onslaught of the Soviet-Mongolian troops, the Japanese command began to withdraw its armies to the Changchun-Dairen line, where they hoped to delay our further advance. At the same time, the retreating Japanese troops were ordered to blow up and mine bridges and main railway lines, infrastructure and communication lines, as well as poison sources fresh water. But all these measures could no longer affect the course of the Soviet offensive.
The most significant success in the first days of the offensive was achieved by the tankers of the 6th Guards Tank Army, who had experience in overcoming mountain passes in the Carpathians. And in the east, the tanks had to take full advantage of this experience. On the first day of the offensive, the 6th Guards Tank Army of the Trans-Baikal Front, practically without resistance, traveled 150 km, the next day another 120 km, reached the foothills of the Bolshoy Khingan ridge and began to overcome it. Climbing the mountains was difficult, and descending was even harder.. At one of the sites, at first one tank was launched, in which only the driver remained from the crew. Tank with increasing speed rushed down. The skill of the driver, who managed to even out the movement and stop the tank at the very foot of the mountain, as soon as it rolled out onto a more gentle area, saved from the disaster. After that, the equipment began to be lowered on cables, when the rear ones served as a kind of anchor for those in front.
By August 12, the advanced units of the 6th Guards Tank Army had overcome the Greater Khingan and with the main forces reached the Central Manchurian Plain, having completed the task a day ahead of schedule. Developing the offensive, Kravchenko's army covered 180 kilometers in a day. The enemy was clearly discouraged by the sudden appearance in his rear of large Soviet mechanized formations.
For many fighters of the 6th Guards Tank Army, the mountains of the Greater Khingan were not the most difficult test. The march through the Gobi desert turned out to be more terrible. The air temperature was 53-56 degrees, and for hundreds of kilometers around there were no signs of the presence of water. The very name of the desert, translated from the Mongolian language, just means “waterless place”. Often before retreating from another locality, the Japanese managed to poison the water in the wells with strychnine. The lack of water remained a terrible scourge until the end of the operation.
Private of the 30th Guards Mechanized Brigade Yakov Grigoryevich Kovrov recalled that those who were not used to such heat lost consciousness. It was easier for him, since he grew up in the steppe, and a long stay in the sun was not new to him. His company was separated from the main forces. The soldiers were exhausted and refused to move on, having lost all hope that this inferno would ever end. After several times the mirage deceived hopes to get to the water, the company lay down, having lost its direction of movement. No one had water left. To the question of the company commander: “Who can get to the battalion headquarters for help?” Yakov Grigoryevich volunteered. He managed to reach the target and indicate the location of the company. In a hurry, several vehicles were unloaded and by the evening they took the dying soldiers to the main forces, where they were given assistance. So Private Yakov Grigoryevich Kovrov saved his comrades.
At this time, the 36th Army, advancing to the north, reached the city of Buheda, an important transport hub. Thus, the key lines of communication between the main forces of the Kwantung Army and the troops stationed in the northern and northwestern regions of Manchuria were cut off. From August 12 to 14, the Japanese tried several times to counterattack the Soviet-Mongolian units, but they failed to achieve success.
By August 14, the troops of the Trans-Baikal Front advanced 250-400 kilometers eastward, having taken an advantageous position for an attack on the main military-political and industrial centers of Manchuria - the cities of Kalgan, Rehe, Mukden, Changchun and Qiqihar.
The offensive of the Red Army developed no less successfully on other fronts. Troops of the 2nd Far Eastern Front, with the support of the Amur military flotilla, crossed the Amur and Ussuri rivers and captured the cities of Lobei, Tongjiang and Fuyuan. On August 14, despite the lack of roads and severe swampy terrain, the armies of the front captured the city of Baoqing, creating a bridgehead for an attack on Harbin.
The 1st Far Eastern Front did not lag behind either. The troops of the front had to conduct combat operations against the most powerful grouping of Japanese troops available in Manchuria and Korea. It was necessary to overcome the well-equipped enemy defense zone, created over many years. In addition, the high speed of the offensive was hindered by difficult terrain: forests, mountains, swamps. And, nevertheless, despite the attempts of the enemy to counteract the advancing, already on the first day Soviet troops broke through the Japanese defense line and rushed deep into Manchuria. The tanks of the advancing units did not break through the enemy's defenses, but the forest, paving the way for infantry, artillery and vehicles. Sappers made decks from broken trees in the most difficult places. As a result of such tactics, it was possible to imperceptibly come close to the Japanese defenses, and somewhere to bypass it, leaving strongholds for destruction by troops advancing in the second echelon. By August 11, Meretskov's troops took the Hunchun fortified area. The left wing of the front began to develop an offensive along the North Korean coast.
On August 12, landings landed by ships of the Pacific Flotilla drove the Japanese out of the ports of Yuki and Racine. And on August 14 - from the port of Seishin. Thus, by the end of August 14, the forces of the Trans-Baikal, 1st and 2nd Far Eastern Fronts were able to cut the Kwantung Army into several parts and deprive them of communication with each other. For 6 days of the campaign, our armies advanced in different sectors from 100 to 500 kilometers. Of the 17 fortified areas, 16 were under the control of Soviet troops. At this, the first stage of the Manchurian operation was completed.
Already the first days of the operation showed that the Soviet offensive caught the Japanese commanders by surprise. Later, captured Japanese generals said that they expected active hostilities to begin no earlier than September, during the driest time of the year, and not during the monsoon season, when roads turn into swamps. The main guarantee of success was the swiftness of the offensive and the high degree of interaction of all branches of the armed forces. It is no coincidence that in the West this operation of the Soviet troops is called the "August Storm". And it's in the most unfavorable weather conditions(August is the rainy season in Manchuria). Particularly noteworthy are the engineering units of the Trans-Baikal Front, which ensured that the 6th Guards Tank Army overcame the Greater Khingan, which was considered impregnable by the Japanese. A great deal of work was done by engineering formations on other fronts, ensuring the advance of our troops through marshy and flood-drenched terrain.
At the beginning of May 1945, soldiers great army, which plunged the “thousand-year-old” Reich into dust, from day to day they expected the end of the war. But the 5th Army, which included the 97th Division, was ordered to rush into the wagons. When the trains left for the East, the soldiers realized that the war was not over for them yet.
Defense structures of Japan
During the entire period of the war between the USSR and Nazi Germany, Japan waited for the right moment to start hostilities from the East. If he claimed the territory to the Urals, then the rest - from the Urals to the Far East - was planned to be seized by Japan. This task was to be carried out by the Kwantung Army, the beauty and pride of Japan, numbering 1 million in service and 1.5 million in reserve. In addition, the troops of Manchukuo, numbering more than 300 thousand people, and the Sungarian flotilla - 25 warships were subordinate to the commander-in-chief of the Kwantung Army. Nurtured in the samurai spirit for four long decades, she went through the practice of war in China and Korea. At the heart of her upbringing lay notorious fanaticism. Each soldier and officer of her carried with him a special dagger for hara-kiri, each, according to samurai customs, at the right time had to be ready for self-sacrifice.
In addition, considering Manchuria already their territory, the Japanese turned it into such a fortified area that they had not yet known. world history. The Japanese absorbed and invested here all the best that was achieved during the construction of the Maginot, Siegfried, Mannerheim lines. 17 fortified areas with a total length of over a thousand kilometers and more than 8 thousand long-term structures were built here. In each fortified area, from three to seven centers of resistance were created. On the heights, they had all-round defense and could support each other with fire. The strength of the fire was such that it could cut down a hundred-year-old forest in an instant.
Around the pillboxes and bunkers there were trenches and machine-gun platforms, which were bordered in one or two belts and complemented the fire system of long-term structures.
But the most stunning, downright amazing, were the pillboxes-ensembles. Equipped with underground concrete shelters, warehouses, power plants, underground communication passages, reservoirs, they were interconnected by underground narrow-gauge railway lines along which trains ran. In high-rise underground structures, equipped with cargo and passenger lifts, the Japanese in an instant could set in motion all hellish destruction machines, including huge 410-mm mortars. At the same time, their reinforced concrete and armored walls and doors could even withstand the fire of ship's cannons. It was impossible to bypass these fortified areas, as the Germans had once bypassed the Maginot Line: their flanks rested on the impenetrable spurs of the East Manchurian mountains.
All these structures were built by the Japanese within 10-15 years. Tens of thousands of Chinese and Manchus were rounded up by them for their erection, and then the unfortunate prisoners were completely destroyed in order to maintain secrecy. And now the Soviet soldiers had to overcome all this.
Preparing for the offensive
At the end of May, the 5th Army arrived at Far East. The movement of troops took place covertly, mainly at night. They were also placed taking into account the rules of camouflage, away from the border areas. At the same time, roads were laid through the wilds from each formation to the place of the planned strike and carefully masked from the air. It seemed that such a grandiose operation - striking from three main directions - could not be carried out covertly, but subsequent events would show that the Japanese were taken by surprise.
The operation will begin - with an artillery attack, which provides for several periods: the first is the preliminary destruction of permanent structures, then the advanced battalions come into action, and within one and a half to two hours before they leave, the artillery strikes, then supports the attack of the fighters by combining a single fire shaft with sequential concentration fire. Further, the artillerymen accompany the troops during the battle in the depths of the enemy's defenses. A special destruction artillery group has been created to destroy the enemy's long-term structures.
On the night of August 8, Soviet troops moved to the border of Manchuria and waited tensely. That night, in the city of Changchun - the capital of Manchuria - the commander of the Kwantung Army, Baron Yamada Otoji, the right hand of the Japanese emperor, was sitting at his headquarters and was talking with a puppet and a traitor to his people, an agent of Japanese intelligence, the so-called Emperor of Manchuria Pu-yi - the last offspring of the Qing dynasty . The baron arrogantly looked at the thin neck of the squishy "emperor", resembling a sleepy marabou bird, and could not get rid of the desire to wave his signature damask sword and separate the fanged poo's head from his frail body.
They drank sake, talked peacefully, smiled sweetly, although they hated each other. They did not suspect anything that at that time all three fronts of the Far Eastern Soviet troops from Baikal to Pacific Ocean are already on the border and waiting for the signal to attack. Baron Yamada will never know what will happen during the night of August 9 until 12 noon in his troops, and when he finds out, he will try to command his armies with ostentatious composure, give orders to the troops, but this will no longer save him from disaster. Very little time will pass, and Baron Yamada will appear before an international tribunal, and the puppet Pu-yi, with whose knowledge the Japanese destroyed hundreds of thousands of Chinese and Manchus, will subsequently be treated kindly.
Start of attack
Soviet troops began hostilities. It was an offensive that the history of wars did not know, remarkable in its design, surprising in its breadth of scope and scale. 1700 kilometers from north to south and 1400 kilometers from east to west, that is, the entire territory of Manchuria, which could accommodate Japan, Germany and Italy combined, the Soviet troops had to ram through with one powerful one. combined blow.
The army command decided to cancel artillery and aviation strikes on long-term points of the Japanese. This decision was made not only because of the onset of monsoon rains. An additional study of the fortified area of the Japanese revealed that in some places there are up to 16 long-term points per kilometer in the Pogranichnensky area, in addition, it is not known what is in the depths and on opposite slopes of the heights. You can hit from planes and guns, but what will be the effectiveness? The pillboxes will certainly not be destroyed, and there will be no surprise strike. And the command of the army decided to capture the enemy points with a night attack, and if there was a failure, they would use everything that was at the ready on the border. And here the main role was to be played by the soldier.
Such a plan also had a degree of risk, but it was based on the vast experience accumulated by the army in breaking through powerful deep-echeloned defensive lines enemy in the West.
The night and day of August 8 passed in anticipation. Not a single bush moved on the border. Everything was carefully disguised. Heavy rain helped to hide the buildup of troops.
On the night of August 9, an attack signal was received. The leading battalions silently moved forward. The soldiers walked in the dark, holding hands so as not to lose their personnel. The sappers paved the way for them in the minefields of the enemy in advance. The fighters climbed the rocky slope of the hill towards the swift water streams, fell, smashed their knees into blood, peeled off their nails. We went through the anti-tank ditch, appeared in front of rows of barbed wire and began to cut them. Each company acted against the pillboxes indicated to it, each had to reach their line at the indicated time, silently remove the protection of the pillboxes in order to hit them all at the same time, and, having stunned the enemy with the suddenness of the blow, did not allow him to recover until the main division strength.
A green rocket went up, and immediately thousands of engines of tanks and vehicles, self-propelled artillery mounts roared. In an instant, the soldiers climbed into the cars, on the armored backs of the tanks, and the entire mechanized armada, turning on the headlights and searchlights, headed for the hill. Now it has become clear that black columns of smoke are rising above the pillboxes, similar to gigantic sinister dragons. The embrasures of many pillboxes choked in fire and smoke.
The gates of the Pogranitsky region were rammed, tanks and motorized units went deep into enemy territory, leaving blocked Japanese garrisons on the heights, who did not want to surrender.
Having captured the commanding heights in the centers of resistance of the Japanese, the battalions of the 233rd regiment at noon on August 9 began to smash the garrisons of military camps located on the western slopes of the mountains with a surprise attack. But the Japanese had already recovered from the first blow. Gray-green avalanches of samurai flew at our troops from the top of the hills with a wild howl of “banzai!”, flashing with blades. They were pressed down by the fire of machine guns and machine guns, they were caught in hand-to-hand combat. It seemed that they were all on the same face, the same height, in the same forms. It was as if they weren't people, but obedient mechanical creatures molded into some sinister machine of war. Without thoughts, without a soul, without their own face and even a name, released for only one purpose - to kill people. They were killed, shot at close range, stabbed with bayonets, strangled with their hands, and they, dexterous, evasive, trained, mastering the techniques of jujitsu and karate, climbed and climbed.
The fighters, who had no idea about all these techniques, beat them backhand, in Russian, beat them in such a way that they crushed their skulls and turned their cheekbones. They passed the Mannerheim line, stormed Koenigsberg. These were not ordinary soldiers, but Soviet soldiers. And they overpowered these specially trained samurai. No one felt the sun rising over the hills, and the day was approaching its zenith. The regiment went out onto the highway, and thereby the enemy defense system in this direction was violated and the transition was provided state border main body of the division.
Part of the forces was left to eliminate the garrisons, who had settled in separate firing points. The pillboxes were really impregnable. Having taken its original position, the self-propelled artillery mount opened fire on the steel cap of the pillbox. The shells bounced off him like peas off a wall. Then, having seized a convenient moment, the sappers climbed onto the bunker, from which the Japanese fired heavily, and, having covered the embrasures of the armored caps with sandbags, laid a charge weighing 250 kg and blew it up on the surface of the bunker.
There was a powerful explosion that shook the entire mountain, but the pillbox did not move. Even after the steel cap was destroyed by the second, 500-kilogram charge, it was not possible to penetrate into the pillbox. Then the sappers laid three more explosive charges, half a ton each: two at the front door and one on the top cover, and blew them up at the same time. The mountain shook like an earthquake.
And when the smoke and dust cleared, the soldiers saw that the explosion had made a hole.
Through it, they rushed into the depths of the pillbox and in hand-to-hand combat broke the resistance of Japanese soldiers and officers. But those in the lower floors of the pillbox continued to resist. Then I had to lay another explosive charge. Thus, enemy pillboxes were suppressed along the entire front of the 5th Army. Meanwhile, the forward detachments of the divisions of the first echelon continued to advance rapidly into the depths of Manchuria.
After the defeat of the Kwantung Army, she had no choice but to admit defeat, and on September 2 she signed an act of unconditional surrender.
August 9 marks the 65th anniversary of the start of the Manchurian strategic offensive operation. Soviet army against the Japanese military.
Manchurian operation- a strategic offensive operation of the Soviet-Mongolian troops in the Far East, carried out on August 9-September 2, 1945 on final stage Second World War. It was aimed at defeating the Japanese Kwantung Army, liberating Northeast China (Manchuria), North Korea and accelerating the end of World War II.
The Manchurian operation unfolded on a front stretching over 4600 km and 200-820 km in depth, in a complex theater of military operations with desert-steppe, mountainous, wooded-swampy, taiga terrain and large rivers. On the border of the USSR and the Mongolian People's Republic(MPR) there were 17 fortified areas with a total length of one thousand kilometers, in which there were about 8 thousand long-term firing structures.
The Kwantung Army (Commander-in-Chief, General Yamada Otozo) consisted of 31 infantry divisions, nine infantry brigades, a brigade special purpose(suicide bombers) and two tank brigades; it consisted of three fronts (1st, 3rd and 17th) consisting of 6 armies, one separate army, two air armies and the Sungari military flotilla. In addition, the following were operationally subordinate to the Commander-in-Chief of the Kwantung Army: the Manchukuo army, consisting of two infantry and two cavalry divisions, 12 infantry brigades, and four separate cavalry regiments; troops of Inner Mongolia (Prince De Wang) and the Suiyuan Army Group, which had four infantry and five cavalry divisions and two cavalry brigades. The total number of the enemy was over 1.3 million people, 6260 guns and mortars, 1155 tanks, 1900 aircraft and 25 ships.
According to the Japanese strategic plan, developed in the spring of 1945, one third of the Kwantung Army, the troops of Manchukuo and Inner Mongolia were left in the border zone with the task of delaying the advance of Soviet troops deep into Manchuria. The main forces concentrated in the central regions of Manchuria were supposed to force the Soviet troops to go on the defensive, and then, together with the reserves that had approached from China and Korea, push them back and invade the territory of the USSR and the MPR.
The idea of the Headquarters of the Soviet Supreme High Command provided for the defeat of the Kwantung Army by simultaneously inflicting two main (from the territory of the Mongolian People's Republic and Soviet Primorye) and a number of auxiliary attacks on directions converging to the center of Manchuria, the rapid dismemberment and destruction of enemy forces in parts. For this, the Trans-Baikal, 1st and 2nd Far Eastern Fronts, the troops of the Mongolian People's Revolutionary Army, which became part of the Soviet-Mongolian cavalry-mechanized group (KMG) of the Trans-Baikal Front, forces Pacific Fleet and the Amur Flotilla.
From May to July 1945, from the west to the Far East and Transbaikalia, it was transferred to a distance of 9-11 thousand km a large number of troops, especially mobile formations. The commander-in-chief of the troops in the Far East was Marshal Soviet Union Alexander Vasilevsky, the coordination of the actions of the forces of the Navy and the Air Force was carried out by Admiral of the Fleet Nikolai Kuznetsov and chief marshal aviation Alexander Novikov.
The commander-in-chief of the MPR troops was Marshal of the MPR Khorlogiyin Choibalsan. For the Manchurian operation, the fronts allocated 10 combined arms (1st and 2nd Red Banner, 5th, 15th, 17th, 25th, 35th, 36th, 39th and 53rd) , one tank (6th Guards), three air (9th, 10th and 12th) armies and KMG of the Soviet-Mongolian troops - a total of 66 rifle, two motorized rifle, two tank and six cavalry (including four Mongolian) divisions, four tank and mechanized corps, 24 separate tank brigades. They numbered over 1.5 million people, over 25,000 guns and mortars, 5,460 tanks and self-propelled artillery mounts, and about 5,000 combat aircraft, including fleet aviation.
On August 9, Soviet troops went on the offensive. Aircraft attacked military targets in Harbin, Changchun and Jilin (Jilin), on areas of concentration of troops, communication centers and communications of the enemy in the border zone. The Pacific Fleet (commanded by Admiral Ivan Yumashev), having entered the Sea of Japan, cut the communications linking Korea and Manchuria with Japan, and inflicted air and naval artillery strikes on naval bases in Yuki (Ungi), Rasin (Najin) and Seishin (Chongjin). ).
The troops of the Trans-Baikal Front (commander Marshal of the Soviet Union Rodion Malinovsky) overcame the waterless desert-steppe regions and the Great Khingan mountain range, defeated the enemy in the Kalgan, Solun and Hailar directions, and on August 18-19 reached the approaches to the most important industrial and administrative centers of Manchuria.
In order to speed up the capture of the Kwantung Army and prevent the enemy from evacuating or destroying material assets, airborne assault forces were landed in Harbin on August 18, and on August 19 in Girin, Changchun, and Mukden. The main forces of the 6th Guards Tank Army, having occupied Changchun and Mukden (Shenyang), began to move south to Dalny (Dalian) and Port Arthur (Lu Shun). The KMG of the Soviet-Mongolian troops (commanded by Colonel-General Issa Pliev), leaving on August 18 to Zhangjiakou (Kalgan) and Chengde, cut off the Kwantung Army from the Japanese troops in Northern China.
The troops of the 1st Far Eastern Front (commanded by Marshal of the Soviet Union Kirill Meretskov) broke through the enemy’s border fortified areas, repelled strong Japanese counterattacks in the Mudanjiang region and approached Kirin on August 19, the 25th Army, in cooperation with the landing forces of the Pacific Fleet, captured the ports of North Korea - Yuki, Rasin, Seishin and Genzan (Wonsan), and then liberated the territory of North Korea. The retreat routes of the Japanese troops to the mother country were cut off.
The troops of the 2nd Far Eastern Front (commander General of the Army Maxim Purkaev), in cooperation with the Amur military flotilla (commander Rear Admiral Neon Antonov), crossed the Amur and Ussuri rivers, broke through the enemy’s long-term defenses in the Sakhalyan (Heihe) region, overcame the Lesser Khingan mountain range; On August 20, the 15th Army of the Front occupied Harbin. Having advanced 500-800 km from the west, 200-300 km from the east and 200 km from the north, Soviet troops reached the Central Manchurian Plain, divided the Japanese troops into isolated groups and completed the maneuver to encircle them. On August 19, Japanese troops almost everywhere began to surrender.
The rapid offensive of the Soviet and Mongolian troops put the Japanese in a hopeless situation, the calculations of the Japanese command for a stubborn defense and the subsequent counteroffensive were thwarted. With the defeat of the Kwantung Army and the loss of the military-economic base on the mainland - Northeast China and North Korea - Japan lost the real strength and capabilities to continue the war.
On September 2, 1945, the Japanese Surrender Act was signed in Tokyo Bay aboard the US battleship Missouri. Losses during the operation amounted to: the Japanese - over 674 thousand people killed and captured, the Soviet troops - 12,031 people were killed, 24,425 people were injured.
In terms of concept, scope, dynamism, method of accomplishing tasks, and in terms of final results, the Manchurian operation is one of the outstanding operations of the Red Army in World War II. Soviet military art was enriched by the experience of conducting an unprecedented regrouping of troops from the west to the east of the country at distances from 9 to 12 thousand km, maneuvering large forces over long distances in the mountain-taiga and desert theater of operations, organizing interaction between ground forces with the Navy and Air Force.
(Military Encyclopedia. Chairman of the Main Editorial Commission S.B. Ivanov. Military Publishing. Moscow, in 8 volumes -2004. ISBN 5 - 203 01875 - 8)
The creation of a special leadership body - the High Command of the Soviet Forces in the Far East - favorably affected the efficiency of command and control, the clarity of coordination of the actions of the three fronts, the fleet and aviation. The success of the offensive of the Soviet-Mongolian troops was facilitated by the help of the population of the liberated regions. The defeat of Japan in the 2nd World War gave impetus to the national liberation movement in the countries of the Asia-Pacific region.
During the operation, Soviet troops showed mass heroism, courage and bravery. 93 people were awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.
Material prepared on the basis of information open sources
Manchurian operation of 1945
The Manchurian operation of 1945, a strategic offensive operation in the Far East at the final stage of World War II, carried out on August 9 - September 2 by the troops of the Trans-Baikal, 1st and 2nd Far Eastern Fronts and the Mongolian People's Revolutionary Army in cooperation with the Pacific fleet and the Red Banner Amur Flotilla. M.'s purpose about. was to defeat the Japanese. Kwantung Army, liberate the North-East. China (Manchuria) and North. Korea and thereby deprive Japan of the military-economic. bases on the mainland, a springboard for aggression against the USSR and the MPR, and to hasten the end of World War II. The concept of the operation provided for the application of two main ones (from the territory of the Mongolian People's Republic and Primorye) and several auxiliary ones. strikes in areas converging in the center of Manchuria, which ensured deep coverage of the main. forces of the Kwantung Army, dissecting them and quickly defeating them in parts. The operation was carried out at the front stretching St. 5000 km, to a depth of 200-800 km, on a complex theater of operations with desert-steppe, mountain, wooded-marshy, taiga terrain and large rivers. Japanese the command provided for stubborn resistance to the Sov.-Mong. troops in the border fortified areas, and then on the mountain ranges that block the way from the ter. Mongolian People's Republic, Transbaikalia, Amur and Primorye to the center, districts of Manchuria (North-East China). In the event of a breakthrough of this line, the withdrawal of the Japanese was allowed. troops on the line the village of Tumyn-Changchun-Far (Dalian), where it was supposed to organize a defense, and then go on the offensive in order to restore the original situation. Based on this, ch. Japanese forces. troops were concentrated in the center, districts of Manchuria and only 1/3 in the border zone. The Kwantung Army (commander-in-chief, General Yamada) included the 1st, 3rd Fronts, 4th Det. and the 2nd Air Army and the Sungari River Flotilla.
Aug 10 The 17th (Korean) Front and the 5th Air Force were operationally subordinated to the Kwantung Army. army in Korea. Total number Japanese troops in the North-East. China and Korea exceeded 1 million people. They were armed with 1155 tanks, 5360 op., 1800 aircraft and 25 ships. In addition, on ter. Manchuria and Korea were, therefore, the number of Japanese. gendarmerie, police, railway and other formations, as well as the troops of Manchukuo and the Japanese. henchman of the prince Ext. Mongolian Dewan. With the introduction of owls. troops into Manchuria, most of the troops of Manchukuo fled. On the border with the USSR and the MPR, there were 17 fortified areas with a total length of up to 1 thousand km, in which there were approx. 8 thousand long-term fire structures. Owls. and mong. troops numbered more than 1,500 thousand people, St. 26 thousand guns and mortars (without anti-aircraft guns, artillery), approx. 5.3 thousand tanks and self-propelled guns, 5.2 thousand aircraft (taking into account the aviation of the Pacific Fleet and the Red Banner Amur, flotillas). Owls. The Navy had 93 warships in the Far East. classes (2 cruisers, 1 leader, 12 squadrons, destroyers and 78 submarines). The general leadership of troops in M. o. carried out specially created by the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command Ch. command of the owls troops in the Far East (commander-in-chief - Marshal of the Soviet Union A. M. Vasilevsky, member of the Military Council - Colonel General I. V. Shikin, Head of Staff - Colonel General S. P. Ivanov ). The commander-in-chief of the MPR troops was Marshal Kh. Choibalsan.
Aug 9 shock groupings of the fronts went on the offensive from the ter. The Mongolian People's Republic and Transbaikalia on the Khingan-Mukden direction, from the Amur region - on the Sungarian direction, and from Primorye - on the Harbino-Girinsky direction. Bombard, aviation of the fronts struck a mass. military strikes. objects in Harbin, Changchun and Jilin (Jiling), on the areas of concentration of troops, communication centers and communications of the avenue. Pacific. the fleet (command, adm. I. S. Yumashev) attacked the Japanese with the forces of aviation and torpedo boats. Naval Base in Sev. Korea - Yuki (Ungi), Racine (Najin) and Seishin (Chongjin). Troops of the Trans-Baikal Front (17th, 39th, 36th and 53rd combined arms, 6th guards tank, 12th air army and cavalry mech group - KMG - Soviet-Mong. troops; commander Marshal Sov. Union R. Ya. Malinovsky) by August 18-19. overcame the waterless steppes, the Gobi Desert and the mountain ranges of B. Khingan, defeated the Kalgan, Solun and Hailar groups of the pr-ka and rushed to the center, the regions of the North-East. China. Aug 20 ch. forces of the 6th Guards. tank, armies (commander - colonel-gen. tank, troops of A. G. Kravchenko) entered Mukden (Shenyang) and Changchun and began to move south to the years. Far and Port Arthur (Luishun). KMG Soviet-Mong. troops, leaving 18 Aug. to Kalgan (Zhangjiakou) and Rehe (Chengde), cut off the Kwantung Army from the Japanese. troops in the North. China (see Khingan-Mukden operation 1945). Troops of the 1st Far East. front (35th, 1st Red Banner, 5th and 25th combined arms armies, 10th mechanized corps and 9th air army; commander Marshal of the Soviet Union K. A. Meretskov), advancing towards the Transbaikal front, broke through the border fortifications. areas of the avenue, repelled strong Japanese counterattacks in the Mudanjiang region. troops and 20 Aug. entered Kirin and together with the formations of the 2nd Far East. front - to Harbin. The 25th Army, in cooperation with the landed seas. Pacific landings. fleet liberated the ports of the North. Korea - Yuki, Rasin, Seishin and Wonsan, and then the whole North. Korea to the 38th parallel, cutting off the Japanese. troops from the metropolis (see the Harbino-Girinsky operation of 1945). Troops of the 2nd Far East. front (2nd Red Banner, 15th, 16th combined arms and 10th air armies, 5th separate rifle corps, Kamchatka defense, district; commander of the army general M. A. Purkaev) in cooperation with Red Banner. Amur, the flotilla (commander of Rear Adm. N. V. Antonov) successfully crossed pp. Cupid and Ussuri, broke through long-term. the defense of the avenue in the districts of Sakhalin (Heihe), Fugdin (Fujin), overcame the M. Khingan mountain range and on August 20. together with the troops of the 1st Dalnevost. front captured Harbin (see Sungaria operation of 1945). Thus, by 20 Aug. owls. troops advanced deep into the North-East. China from 3. to 400–800 km, from east to 200–300 km, and from north to 200–300 km. They went to the Manchurian Plain (Songliao), dismembered the Japanese. troops into a number of isolated groupings and completed their encirclement.
From 19 Aug. Japanese troops almost everywhere began to surrender. In order to speed up this process, to prevent them from evacuating or destroying material values, during the period from 18 to 27 August. air were planted. landings in Harbin, Mukden, Changchun, Girin, Port Arthur, Dalniy, Pyongyang, Kanko (Hamhung) and other cities. For this purpose, army mobile forward detachments also operated, which successfully completed their tasks. The rapid advance of the owls. and mong. troops put the Japanese troops in a hopeless situation, the calculations of the Japanese command for a stubborn defense and the subsequent counteroffensive were thwarted. The Kwantung Army was defeated. With the defeat of the Kwantung Army and the loss of the military-economic. bases on the mainland - North-East. China and Sev. Korea - Japan lost real strength and the ability to continue the war. Japanese defeat. troops in Manchuria created the conditions for South Sakhalin operation 1945 and Kuril landing operation 1945. According to the concept, scope, dynamism, method of performing tasks and the final results, M. o. - one of the outstanding operations of the Sov. Armed. Forces in the 2nd World War. In M. about. owls. military art was enriched by the experience of carrying out an unprecedented regrouping of troops from the 3rd to the east of the country at distances from 9 to 12 thousand km, maneuvering large forces over long distances in the mountain-taiga and desert Far Eastern theater of operations, and "organizing the interaction of ground forces with the Navy. The military army is instructive in its large scope, the skillful choice of the directions of the main strikes and the time of the start of operations, the creation of a decisive superiority of forces and means in the main directions with a very wide width of the offensive zones of the fronts and armies. and armies, but also formations, which was determined by the isolation of operational areas.A feature of the operational formation of the troops of the Transbaikal Front was the presence of tanks, armies and KMG in the first echelon of the front, which played an important role in achieving high rates of offensive troops. during the course of hostilities, there was aviation, which made more than 22 thousand sorties.Aviation was widely used for reconnaissance, landing troops and delivering cargo, especially fuel for the tank army. During the operation, 16,500 people were transported by air, approx. 2780 tons of fuel, 563 tons of ammunition and approx. 1500 tons of other cargo.
M.'s feature about. was that the general leadership of the troops was carried out in it by the High Command of the Soviets, specially created by the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command. troops in the Far East. This significantly affected the efficiency of command and control, the clarity of coordination of the actions of the three fronts, the fleet and aviation in the largest strategic operation. In the successful offensive of the owls. troops in Manchuria, an important role was played by the purposeful party-polite. work aimed at ensuring high morale of the troops and will advance. impulse. Much attention was paid to the clarification of personal. the composition of the essence of hostile acts of Japan. militarists against our Motherland, features of hostilities in the Far Eastern theater of operations, internats. liberates, the missions of the Sov. Armed. Forces in the campaign in the Far East. As a result of the rapid and brilliantly conducted M. o. Manchuria, liberated by owls. troops together with the Mong. People's Army, has become a reliable military strategist. foothold of the revolution forces of China, the new political. whale center. revolution. M. o. was ch. content of the final period of the 2nd World War. Owls. The Union and its Armament. Forces as a result of M. about. defeated one of the most important groupings of the Japanese. overland troops on the mainland - the Kwantung Army, which forced Japan to accept the terms of the Potsdam Declaration of the Allied States (see the Potsdam Conference of 1945). With their victories over the strike forces of the fascist. bloc in Europe and a brilliant victory in Manchuria Sov. The Union made a decisive contribution to the defeat of militaristic Japan. 2 Sept. 1945 Japan was forced to sign at Tokyo Hall. aboard the Amer. battleship "Missouri" act of surrender. As a result of the victory over Japan, favorable conditions were created for the development of national liberation in Asian countries. movement, for the victory of Nar. revolutions in China, North. Korea and Vietnam. M. o. was a vivid demonstration of the power of the Soviets. Armed. Force.
G. K. Plotnikov.
Used materials of the Soviet military encyclopedia in 8 volumes, volume 5.
Literature:
History of the Great Patriotic War Soviet Union. 1941-1945. T. 5. M., 1963;
Liberation mission in the East. M., 1976;
Shikin I. V., Sapozhnikov B. G. Feat on the Far Eastern Frontiers. M., 1975
Liberation Mission of the Soviet Armed Forces in World War II. Ed. 2nd. M., 1974
Vnotchenko D.N. Victory in the Far East. Military-ist. an essay on the combat operations of owls. troops in Aug.-Sept. 1945 ed. 2nd. M., 1971;
The final. Historical-memoir essay on the defeat of the imperialist .. Japan in 1945. Ed. 2nd. M., 1969;
Hattori Takushiro. Japan in the war 1941-1945. Per. from Japanese. M., 1973.
The Manchurian offensive operation was carried out by the troops of the Armed Forces of the USSR and the Mongolian People's Revolutionary Army on August 9 - September 2, 1945 with the aim of defeating the Japanese Kwantung Army and liberating Manchuria and North Korea from the Japanese militarists.
For its successful implementation, the Soviet command transferred to the Far East part of the troops and equipment released in the European theater of operations, which, together with the troops stationed here, made up 3 fronts: Transbaikal (Marshal R.Ya. Malinovsky), 1st Far East (Marshal K. A. Meretskov), 2nd Far East (Army General M.A. Purkaev). A total of 131 divisions and 117 brigades - over 1.5 million people, over 27 thousand guns and mortars, over 700 rocket launchers, 5250 tanks and self-propelled guns, over 3.7 thousand aircraft. They were supplemented by the forces of the Pacific Fleet (Admiral I.S. Yumashev), the Amur Military Flotilla (Rear Admiral N.V. Antonov), the border troops of the Primorsky, Khabarovsk and Trans-Baikal border districts. They were opposed by a large strategic grouping of Japanese troops, the basis of which was the Kwantung Army (General O. Yamada), consisting of ground forces, the Sungarian military river flotilla and troops of puppet armies - in total over 1 million people, 6260 guns and mortars, 1155 tanks, 1900 aircraft, 25 ships.
During the operation, it was planned to deliver 2 main blows to the center of Manchuria from the territory of Mongolia and Primorye and several auxiliary ones in order to encircle the main forces of the Kwantung Army, their subsequent dissection and liquidation.
Forward and reconnaissance detachments of all Soviet fronts launched an offensive on August 9, 1945, with the support of aviation, inflicting massive strikes on enemy military targets. At the same time, the Pacific Fleet cut communications linking Korea and Manchuria with Japan and attacked Japanese naval bases in North Korea. Having overcome the steppes, the Gobi Desert and the mountain ranges of the Greater Khingan, the troops of the Trans-Baikal Front, having defeated a number of Japanese military groupings, liberated Changchun and Shenyang and cut off the Kwantung Army from the troops of North Korea. To meet them from Primorye, the troops of the 1st Far Eastern Front, breaking through the defenses and repelling a number of strong counterattacks by the Japanese, occupied Kirin and Harbin, and, in cooperation with the landing forces of the Pacific Fleet, captured the ports of Ungi, Najin, Chongjin, Wonsan, and then liberated North Korea to the 38th parallel. In cooperation with the Amur military flotilla, the troops of the 2nd Far Eastern Front crossed the Amur and Ussuri rivers, and having overcome the Small Khingan mountain range, together with units of the 1st Far Eastern Front, liberated Harbin.
By August 20, Soviet troops, having reached the Central Manchurian Plain, completed the dismemberment of Japanese troops into separate groups with their complete encirclement, and on August 19, Japanese troops began to surrender almost everywhere.
