Nomonhan, 1939: The Red Army's Victory That Shaped World War II
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There were other, more mundane lessons to be absorbed. Japanese infantry daringly clambering upon their vehicles had taught the Soviet tankmen the necessity of having hatch lids that could be locked from the inside. This deficiency had cost the 11th Tank Brigade dearly on July 3. Also, the Soviet BT-5 and BT-7 tanks were too easily set afire by even primitive hand-thrown firebombs. The exposed ventilation grill and exhaust manifold on the rear deck was especially vulnerable and had to be shielded somehow.
In a broader sense, recalled the future marshal of the Red Army, “The experience of the battle in the Bain Tsagan area showed that tank and motorized troops skillfully cooperating with air force and mobile artillery are a decisive means for carrying out swift military operations.”53 Zhukov was discovering a powerful formula. He was by no means the first to conceive of combining these elements of mobile firepower, but very few men would have his opportunities to apply that formula in such crucial tests.
Finally, the Japanese July offensive confirmed Zhukov’s initial judgment that the Nomonhan incident was no mere border clash. To the Soviets it appeared evident that the Japanese, who had initiated the fighting in early May and had escalated the scope and intensity of the combat on May 28, June 27, and July 3, were intent upon further aggression. The highest leadership in Moscow now agreed with Zhukov’s assessment. They were privy, through Richard Sorge’s espionage ring in Tokyo, to Japan’s redoubled efforts to draw Germany into an anti-Soviet military alliance. It was a danger that now had to be taken in deadly seriousness. At this point, Stalin and Vyacheslav Molotov began indicating explicitly to Joachim von Ribbentrop and Adolf Hitler that Berlin’s attitude toward the Soviet-Japanese conflict was one of the crucial factors in the Soviet evaluation of a possible rapprochement with Germany.54
At the same time, Moscow decided to send Zhukov the additional reinforcements he was requesting. Tens of thousands of men and machines were ordered to Mongolia, many from European Russia. Foreign diplomats traveling the Trans-Siberian Railway reported eastbound trains jammed with military personnel and equipment.55 The Soviet buildup encountered a serious logistical problem at Borzya, the easternmost railhead in the MPR, some four hundred miles from the Halha River. To prevent men and materiel from piling up in a horrible bottleneck at Borzya, a massive truck transport operation was required. Virtually every truck in the Soviet Far East was commandeered for that purpose. The Trans-Baikal Military District, commanded by the same General Shtern who had led the Soviet troops at Changkufeng, supervised this effort. Thousands of trucks, half-tracks, gun-towing tractors, and other vehicles were organized into a continuous shuttle along the eight-hundred-mile, five-day round-trip route.56
Meanwhile, east of the Halha, many Japanese officers both in the 23rd Division staff and at KwAHQ would not and could not accept a verdict of failure for the July offensive that they had launched with such confidence. The balance had to be redressed. General Komatsubara did not return to Hailar but instead established a temporary divisional headquarters at Kanchuerhmiao, where he and his staff wrestled with the problem of overcoming superior enemy firepower. They decided that night combat, a traditional mainstay of Japanese infantry tactics, might provide a solution. At night, they reasoned, the effectiveness of Soviet armor and artillery would be minimized, allowing the incomparable Japanese infantry to come to grips with the enemy at close quarters and prevail.
At 9:30 p.m. on July 7, a thirty-minute Japanese artillery barrage preceded a nighttime assault by elements of Komatsubara’s 64th and 72nd Regiments. The Soviet 149th Infantry Regiment and supporting Mongolian cavalry were taken by surprise and forced to fall back toward the Halha and regroup before counterattacking. Reinforcements were brought up by both sides and in the bloody hand-to-hand combat that ensued the Japanese were pushed part way back, but they ended with a net advance. Major I. M. Remizov, commander of the 149th Regiment, was killed in this action. For his bravery under fire, he was posthumously decorated as a Hero of the Soviet Union and his command post that night renamed Remizov Heights.
Since late May, Soviet engineers had built no fewer than seven bridges across the Halha and the smaller Holsten Rivers to support their operations. At least one of these bridges was underwater, invisible to the Japanese except when Soviet trucks were seen to miraculously drive across the surface of the Halha. On the night of July 7–8, Japanese demolition teams blew up two Soviet bridges. Komatsubara believed that if he could destroy the bridges, he could disrupt enemy operations east of the Halha, thus accomplishing his mission of securing the border. His night attacks steadily constricted Zhukov’s bridgehead east of the Halha.
This pattern of night attacks was repeated from July 8 to July 12, with Japanese attacks against various points on the Soviet perimeter.57 Soviet resistance stiffened as the pattern of Japanese action was recognized. Casualties on both sides mounted in these relatively small but bitterly fought actions. In the hours of darkness, Japanese audacity and cold steel prevailed. At daybreak, the forward Japanese positions, especially those just wrested from the Soviets in the previous night’s fighting, would be subjected to merciless artillery bombardment, to which the Japanese artillery replied weakly. Soviet artillery barrages were followed by counterattacks by motorized infantry and armor. In this deadly two-steps-forward, one-step-back shuffle, the Japanese were making gradual, albeit costly, progress. Their biggest problem was the superiority of Soviet artillery and the lack of effective countervailing artillery support. Japanese infantry commanders learned that to remain at advanced positions in the low ground, easily spotted by Soviet artillery and tanks, brought death in the daytime. They had to pull back behind heights away from the river and lie low until nightfall.
On the night of July 11–12, all three battalions of Yamagata’s 64th Regiment and elements of Colonel Sakai Mikio’s 72nd Regiment set out to storm the Soviet bridgehead. Passing grim remains of Azuma’s recon unit destroyed May 28, Yamagata’s 1st Battalion charged the bridgehead, knocked out several Soviet tanks, and pushed the defenders back toward the river. By 4:30 a.m. the 1st Battalion was on the downward slope of the high ground 1,500 yards from the Halha. Its lead elements were as close as five hundred yards from the river, but thirty Soviet tanks and armored cars pinned them down there. At that point, two companies of Soviet infantry supported by fifteen tanks counterattacked from the high ground on the left while Soviet artillery hammered the attackers from the right flank and rear. Japanese rapid-fire guns took on the Soviet armor but were struck by Soviet artillery west of the Halha and smashed. Japanese demolition teams approached the main Soviet bridge near the confluence of the two rivers but ran into two groups of Soviet armored vehicles from the 11th Armored Brigade, which threw them back. Soviet infantry and tanks surrounded the 1st Battalion. Soldiers from both sides hurled grenades at each other from thirty yards. Soviet flame-throwing tanks joined the melee. The din of battle was literally deafening. As the day wore on, five successive Soviet counterattacks by two infantry battalions and 150–160 armored vehicles of the 11th Armored Brigade, with powerful artillery support, again pushed the Japanese back nearly to their jump-off point of the night before. Brigade Commander Yakovlev of the 11th Armored personally led the counterattacks, died a “glorious death,” and like Remizov, was made a Hero of the Soviet Union.58 The tank in which he perished stands as a monument on the battlefield today.
The action of July 11–12 would prove to be the high-water mark of Kwantung Army’s attempt to expel the Soviet/MPR “invaders” from east of the Halha. Later that day, General Komatsubara decided to suspend the night attacks that had been so costly to his infantry. That night alone the 64th Regiment had suffered eighty to ninety killed and three times that many wounded. Komatsubara’s decision would become a controversial one. Months later, the 23rd Division commander claimed that he had not realized how close his 64th Regiment had come to taking the bridge. Other considerations, however, influenced the decision to suspend the night attacks.
Throughout the figh
ting at Nomonhan, the Soviet advantage in artillery, quantitative and qualitative, had become painfully clear to the Japanese. The Soviet guns had taken a heavy toll and time and again had forced Japanese infantry to pull back from hard-won but exposed positions. Besides their actual destructiveness, there are few things as damaging to the morale of infantrymen as to be subjected to incessant artillery bombardment to which one’s own guns do not make effective reply. On July 9 KwAHQ informed General Komatsubara that he would soon receive powerful new artillery reinforcements. Kwantung Army would virtually strip its other divisions of heavy artillery and mass them at Nomonhan. In addition, AGS sent the 3rd Heavy Field Artillery Brigade from Japan to Kwantung Army. It also went to Nomonhan. This brigade consisted of a regiment of sixteen 150-mm howitzers (the 1936 model, the most modern in the Imperial Army) and a regiment of sixteen 100-mm artillery (also modern 1932 models). Both regiments were fully motorized, their guns pulled by tractors and ammunition carried by trucks, unlike the 23rd Division’s organic artillery, which was horse drawn. The 3rd Artillery Brigade had been earmarked for Kwantung Army for some time, because heavy artillery was not needed in the homeland and Kwantung Army was known to lack firepower vis-à-vis the Red Army. The fighting at Nomonhan merely speeded the deployment of this unit to Manchukuo.59
AGS hoped that Kwantung Army, thus reinforced, would be able to best the enemy in a large-scale artillery duel—and then withdraw from Nomonhan after achieving “satisfaction.” Kwantung Army had a more ambitious idea. Their massed artillery would neutralize the Soviets’ heavy guns and armor, allowing their infantry to advance to the Halha, expel the invaders, and bring the conflict to a victorious conclusion. In Tokyo and Hsinking, this seemed like a relatively safe and inexpensive way to “even the score” at Nomonhan.
By the third week of July, the Japanese had amassed eighty-six heavy guns—100-mm artillery and 120-mm and 150-mm heavy artillery and howitzers—in the Nomonhan area. This Artillery Corps was commanded by Major General Uchiyama Eitaro, Kwantung Army’s senior artillery officer. It was Uchiyama who prevailed upon Komatsubara to halt the 23rd Division’s night attacks, so that Soviet artillery would not be pulled back out of range of his guns and his artillery could have a clear field of fire without fear of harming friendly infantry.
Uchiyama planned to overwhelm the Soviet positions by firing as many as 15,000 rounds per day for several days.60 To Japanese commanders who had not experienced trench warfare and massive artillery bombardments in the First World War, this was an unheard-of volume of shell fire.
Meanwhile, reinforcements and supplies poured steadily into the Zhukov’s First Army Group, including two additional artillery regiments and literally thousands of tons of artillery shells.
As the array of Japanese heavy artillery was brought into position along the line, the infantry was heartened. Infantry commanders asked newly arrived artillery officers to fire even if the enemy were out of range, because the big guns were good for the morale of the Japanese troops who had been badly outgunned until then. This was not a moot point, since the Japanese 120-mm howitzers had a maximum range of 5,500 yards and could only reach the enemy if deployed relatively close to Soviet lines, exposing them to deadly counterbattery fire.61
On the morning of July 23, the Japanese artillery opened fire with a thunderous sustained barrage that brought cheers from nearby Japanese troops. Before long, the Soviet guns began to reply, and soon a deadly storm of fire and steel was crashing back and forth across the Halha.
As the day wore on, each side intensified its bombardment. Stripped to the waist, Japanese and Soviet gunners alike sweated profusely at their work. The Japanese were dismayed to find that the rate of Soviet fire, far from slackening, soon reached and then exceeded their own. Many Soviet guns that seemed to have been silenced in the morning had been relocated and rejoined the fight from new firing positions later in the day. From the somewhat higher western shore of the Halha, the Soviet gunners were able to pour a torrent of fire down onto the Japanese. Their big guns outranged the Japanese. Their elevation also gave them an advantage in observing the impact of their shellfire and making corrections to improve accuracy.
The Japanese army had no modern experience with counterbattery firing. They did not receive much help from friendly spotter aircraft, because Kwantung Army’s 2nd Air group had lost control of the sky over the battlefield. Soviet fighters sometimes strafed the Japanese gun positions. General Uchiyama’s men actually attempted to use artillery spotters in balloons suspended above the battlefield to direct their fire. Naturally, when the balloons went up, Soviet fighter planes attacked and shot them down. This was repeated twice during the day, testimony both to the courage of the balloonists working in open gondolas and to the antiquated techniques of the Japanese army. After having two balloons shot down, the balloon observation unit was withdrawn and returned to service with the China Expeditionary Army, where such methods still could be employed against an enemy that possessed virtually no air force. A Japanese artillery officer estimated that on July 23, Soviet guns fired 30,000 rounds to the Japanese 10,000.62
The intense shelling subsided at nightfall, only to be resumed with added fury the following morning. The Japanese hoped that on this second day of the duel, the enemy’s store of ammunition would become depleted. This was not the case. Zhukov had used the hours of darkness to bring up all his artillery from the rear as well as a tremendous amount of ammunition. On that day, the rate, volume, and accuracy of the Soviet artillery fire far exceeded that of the Japanese. The Japanese artillerists were stunned. Komatsubara’s long-suffering infantry was forced to endure the most terrible bombardment any of them had ever experienced. By the third day of the artillery duel, it became clear that the Soviets held the upper hand. Their ammunition supply seemed inexhaustible and their accuracy improved, especially in counterbattery fire.
In infantry combat at close quarters, fighting spirit counts for a great deal. With artillery, however, it is size and weight that counts. From the start, the Japanese artillery offensive had no chance of success. First, they simply did not have enough ammunition. Never having engaged in such an operation before, they had no idea how much ammunition would be consumed. Kwantung Army allocated 70 percent of its entire artillery ammunition stock to this operation. Two-thirds of that was expended in the first two days. As the Japanese rate of fire slackened, Soviet fire intensified. Zhukov had more ammunition, more guns, and better guns. The Japanese gunners were not trained to fire artillery much beyond 6,000 yards and howitzers not beyond 5,000. They had never conducted live-fire practice at maximum range. But the Soviet heavy guns were deployed in several lines, the closest 8,000–10,000 yards away. Beyond this line were other guns, especially 152-mm artillery that the Japanese guns could not even attempt to engage, but which were able to hit the Japanese gun lines at 14,000–15,000 yards. A Japanese artillery regiment commander said his guns were once attacked by Soviet 152-mm cannons at 18,000 yards. The maximum range of the Soviet heavy artillery was 20,800 yards; of their best 152-mm howitzers, 16,500 yards. In addition, the Soviet artillery commanders, some of whom had been operating in the area since May, knew the east shore of the Halha intimately. Not only did they use good spotting techniques, but they had also preregistered potential targets. To some Japanese officers, the region seemed like one vast Soviet firing range.63
On day three, a group of 23rd Division infantry officers in shame-faced dismay asked General Komatsubara if the artillery attack might not be suspended, since the enemy’s return fire was “saturating” and “smothering” the positions of their men unfortunate enough to be stationed near their own big guns.64 A similar conclusion was reached that day at KwAHQ, where the lesson was driven home that they could not match the Red Army in materiel. In a spirit of gloom, on July 25, Kwantung Army ended its artillery attack, which had provided yet another humiliating failure.
As they assessed the results of the fighting in July, the General Staff and Army Ministry in Tokyo
recognized the futility of trying to achieve a military victory at Nomonhan and shifted toward pursuing a diplomatic settlement, even if concessions had to be made to the Soviet Union and the MPR. Kwantung Army, however, vehemently opposed such negotiations, fearing that they might lead to a repetition of the “Changkufeng debacle” and be interpreted by the enemy as a sign of weakness. For many in Kwantung Army, Nomonhan had become an issue of honor and pride. In Tsuji’s words, Kwantung Army, “insisting that the second phase of the fighting represented a tie because of the heavy losses inflicted on the Soviet side, showed its reluctance to yield even one foot [of the disputed territory].”65
The differences in outlook and policy between AGS and Kwantung Army were clear, as was the central army authorities’ failure to impose their will on the field army in Manchukuo. Much of the military establishment was abuzz with stories of how deeply gekokujo had taken hold within Kwantung Army and in relations between that army and the General Staff. To ensure Kwantung Army’s compliance with their latest directives, AGS ordered General Isogai to Tokyo for detailed briefings and instructions regarding Tokyo’s attitude toward the Nomonhan incident. At KwAHQ too there was embarrassment about the stories of their undisciplined insubordination. Some were sufficiently sensitive on that score that the Kwantung Army chief of staff pointedly flew to Tokyo without any of his staff officers, making a show of his independence from the middle-echelon staff.66
On July 20 General Isogai arrived at General Staff Headquarters for what would be an emotion-charged scene. Before a group of senior General Staff officers, Isogai was told in no uncertain terms that the central authorities had decided to settle the Nomonhan incident “unilaterally,” by winter at the very latest. Isogai then was handed a formal AGS document, “Essentials for Settlement of the Nomonhan Incident.” These “Essentials” went beyond the earlier prohibition against air strikes into enemy territory. They specified a step-by-step program whereby Kwantung Army was to maintain its defensive position east of the Halha River while the government attempted to settle the dispute through diplomatic negotiations. In the event that negotiations were unsuccessful, Kwantung Army’s forces, “would be withdrawn upon the advent of winter to the boundary claimed by the Soviet Union.”67