The Battle of Zaoyang–Yichang, also known as the Battle of Zaoyi (), was one of the 22 major engagements between the National Revolutionary Army and Imperial Japanese Army during the Second Sino-Japanese War.
Background The Japanese were seeking a quicker solution to achieve a Chinese surrender. The Japanese contemplated moving directly down the Yangtze to the relocated Chinese capital, Chongqing. To do so, they would need to capture a critical town in western Hubei province, Yichang.
The Japanese attack did not commit many troops or material, which enabled the main Chinese commander, Li Zongren, who had frustrated the Japanese before, to repel the Japanese.
Battle On 1 May 1940, three divisions of the IJA 11th Army under command of General Waichiro Sonobe began a drive towards Zaoyang. They pushed towards the 5th warzone's strongholds in the Tongbaishan and Dahongshan mountains, attempting to encircle and destroy the Chinese 31st Army Group under General Tang Enbo in a pincer movement. The Chinese strategy aimed to let the Japanese forces run low on supplies, and then counterattack, as had been successfully employed at the Battle of Changsha. When the Japanese managed to outmaneuver Tang's forces, General Zhang Zizhong marched to his aid with the Chinese 33rd Army Group. The Japanese forces rallied and pushed back the Chinese, and General Zhang Zizhong was cut down in a burst of machine gun fire when he refused to retreat from the front lines. He was the most senior Chinese commander to be killed in combat during the war.
After defeating Zhang Zizhong's 33rd army group, the 11th army launched a general offensive against the fourteen to fifteen Chinese divisions gathered around Zaoyang on May 19. The 75th Army and the 56th Division of the 39th Army suffered very heavy casualties and retreated to the west bank of the Tangbai River. At dusk on May 20, the 233rd Infantry Regiment of the 39th Division sent three officers to scout ahead for the crossing point of the Tangbai River. Two of the scouts laid prone on the ground and used telescopes to observe the situation on the other side. The third scout stood upright as incoming gunfire was light and believed that the land they were observing was a sandbar. However, the report from the other two scouts, who judged that it was the opposite bank of the river, was accepted. At midnight on the 21st, the regiment began to land on what was believed to be the other side of the river. As soon as a green signal was fired to indicate a successful crossing, the defending 4th Peace Preservation Regiment of Hubei Province led by Li Langxing (李朗星), which had been lying in wait, opened fire all at once. As the sandbar offered no cover, the regiment quickly suffered heavy losses, losing more than 300 troops including regimental commander Tetsujirō Kanzaki (神崎哲次郎). The Tangbai River crossing became known as the Japanese 39th Division's most tragic battle.
Supporting Operations Chinese Summer Offensive To support the Fifth War Zone in the battle of Zaoyang-Yichang, the Ninth War Zone and a portion of the Third War Zone launched a wide-scale Summer Offensive against units of the Japanese 11th Army in garrison duties from May to June 1940. In Northern Hunan and Southern Hubei, seven divisions and two guerilla detachments of the Chinese 15th and 27th Group Armies besieged the Japanese 6th Division and 40th Division at Linxiang, Yueyang, Chongyang and Tongcheng. In Northern Jiangxi, more than a hundred thousand Chinese troops from eleven divisions of the 1st, 19th, and 32nd Group Armies besieged the 34th Division in the surrounding areas of Nanchang and the 33rd Division at Anyi, Fengxin, and Jing'an. The 30th Group Army also attacked the 33rd Division near Wuning. During the Chinese offensive, the Japanese Army launched an attack on the 99th Army at Liuyang.
After many weeks of fierce fighting, the 11th Army succeeded in repelling the Chinese attacks on all fronts. In this offensive, the Chinese Army suffered 18,719 casualties including 7,125 killed, 10,369 wounded, and 1,225 missing while the Japanese Army suffered 850 killed and 2,015 wounded. Of all the fronts in the Chinese operation, the Nanchang battlefield between five divisions of the 49th and 70th Armies of the 32nd Group Army of the Third War Zone and three divisions of the 74th Army of the 19th Group Army of the Ninth War Zone and the Japanese 34th Division was the fiercest, accounting for half or more of the casualties in the whole offensive.
The 11th Army recorded that, excluding the battle of Zaoyang-Yichang, its units fought against over 230,000 Chinese troops from units of Ninth War Zone, the 32nd Group Army of the Third War Zone, and certain units of the Fifth War Zone in 784 battles in May and June of 1940, claiming 18,022 abandoned enemy corpses and 712 POWs while suffering 1,062 killed and 2,146 wounded. The Ninth War Zone in May and June and the 32nd Group Army of the Third War Zone in the attack on Nanchang reported suffering 8,826 killed, 11,451 wounded, and 1,061 missing. The Ninth War Zone claimed to have killed or wounded 11,506 Japanese troops of the 6th, 33rd, 34th, and 40th Divisions and captured 6 during the same period.
Liangkou Operation To support the 11th Army's offensive, the South China Area Army deployed the main force of the 38th Division, three infantry battalions of the 18th Division, and one infantry battalion of the 104th Division to capture Liangkou in northeast Guangdong and contain enemy forces south of Hengyang. This operation is known in China as the Second Battle of Northern Guangdong. On May 22, the 229th Infantry Regiment of the 38th Division occupied Liangkou and the main force of the division gathered in its vicinity. At the time, four divisions of the 62nd and 65th Armies besieged the 229th Infantry Regiment at Liangkou from all fronts. Despite being outnumbered, the Japanese regiment held out against the concentrated attack by the large enemy force, with the 2nd and 4th Companies in particular losing more than half of their troops. Meanwhile, the main force of the 104th Division and a portion of the 18th Division launched an offensive against the Chinese besieging Liangkou and inflicted heavy casualties.
Having achieved its operational objective of containing Chinese forces in South China, the South China Area Army ordered the 38th Division to move towards Conghua while the 18th Division and 104th Division returned to their original positions. Interpreting the redeployment of the Japanese units as a retreat, the Chinese Army launched an assault on the 38th Division with reinforcements from the 63rd Army. On June 12, the Japanese 11th Army captured Yichang and the 38th Division was ordered to return to its original position. In the operation, the Guangdong 12th Group Army of the Seventh War Zone suffered 3,068 killed, 2,225 wounded, and 330 missing and the South China Area Army suffered 251 killed and 548 wounded.
Other Operations Aside from the Summer Offensive, various units of the Third War Zone conducted guerrilla warfare against the Japanese 13th Army to support the Fifth War Zone in the battle of Zaoyang-Yichang. From May 1940 to the end of the year, the 108th Division harassed the positions of the 60th Infantry Regiment of the 15th Division near Xuancheng and other places in Southern Anhui. In early June, the 192nd Division and Jiangnan 1st Advance Column launched attacks on strongholds at Wuxing, Wukang, and other places in Zhejiang to contain the 22nd Division. The Sichuanese 146th, 147th, and 148th Divisions of the 21st Army of the 23rd Group Army and the 2nd Jiangxi Peace Preservation Regiment faced a massive attack at Pengze, Hukou, and Duchang in Jiangxi in an effort by the Japanese to stop their river blockade actions and prevent them from supporting the Fifth War Zone, fighting until a stalemate set in at the end of June.
Aftermath According to Japanese records, the Japanese casualties were 2,700 troops killed and 7,800 wounded. Chinese records show that 11,000 Japanese troops were killed. According to the history of the 65th Infantry Regiment of the Japanese 13th Division, the regiment had 280 combat deaths in this battle.星半三郎編，《若松聯隊回想錄》，1977年，會津若松市：若松聯隊記念事業實行委員會，p176-179。
While the Chinese 5th War Area arguably made tactically sound decisions in its battle plans, it was ultimately overwhelmed by the sheer firepower of the Japanese combined arms offensive, relying primarily on small arms to face the onslaught of Japanese air, naval, artillery, and armoured striking power. As the Chinese commanders had surmised, the Japanese forces were overextended, and were not in a position to pursue their victory. However, the Imperial Japanese Navy pushed strongly for the occupation of Yichang, located at the edge of Sichuan and connecting the 5th and 9th War Zones. The Navy felt that it was critically needed as a forward base for air attacks against Chongqing. After considerable argument, the Japanese Army agreed to occupy Yichang. This dealt a considerable blow to the morale and fighting capacity of the Chinese as no large-scale offensive was mounted after this operation.
Chinese casualties The "History of the Anti-Japanese War" recorded Chinese losses as 36,983 killed, 50,509 wounded, and 23,118 missing. Some of the units which took part in the battle were however not included in the casualty statistics, such as the 128th Division which was included in the battle order but its strength or casualties were not recorded in the war history book.國史館檔案史料文物查詢系統，王勁哉電蔣中正襄東會戰奉令以一部進擊臨岳日軍迄與日軍交戰五次官兵傷亡數名現有一○○七九名，典藏號：002-090200-00062-175 The Independent 44th Brigade and Bie Guanghan's self-defense army of the 6th District of Henan Province were recorded in the war history book as suffering very heavy casualties in the fighting on May 7, 1940 at Tanghe County and Yuantan Town. The 732nd Regiment commander of the independent brigade was badly wounded, one battalion—with the exception of over 60 survivors—was completely wiped out, and the other two battalions lost more than half of their troops. The 2nd Regiment commander of the self-defense army was also badly wounded and both units were withdrawn for reorganization after just that day's fighting. Neither units were included in the book's casualty statistics. The various guerrilla units of Li Pinxian's Henan-Hubei-Anhui Border Region guerilla army and all special forces unit, which were included in the battle order, were not included in the casualty statistics. It was also noted in the statistical table that the casualties of the 2nd Army did not include the losses of the 103rd Division.國史館檔案史料文物查詢系統，陳誠電蔣中正何應欽（續前電）呈報第二軍十八軍二十六軍等所屬各師損失及現有概數，典藏號：002-090200-00066-305 The headquarters of the 33rd Group Army suffered 65 killed, 89 wounded, and 95 missing in the battle which was not recorded in the "History of the Anti-Japanese War",國史館檔案史料文物查詢系統，馮治安電蔣中正五十九軍等各部隊自襄東作戰至六月十五日止人員馬騾傷亡及現有待補各數，典藏號：002-090200-00066-308 as was the case with the 8 killed, 3 wounded, and 2 missing suffered by the headquarters of the 11th Group Army.