3.81 Fall and Rise of China: Russo-Japanese War #8: Stalemate at Shaho and Sandepu

Last time we spoke about the bloody siege of Port Arthur. General Maresuke Nogi lost a lot during the Russo-Japanese War, at Port Arthur it would cost him thousands of young men, his last son and in many ways his soul. The 3rd IJA fought tooth and nail to take each feature one by one, inching closer to the port city. Nogi’s initial strategy to target the east was a terrible failure, costing countless men and nearly his command. When prodded by Baron Kodama to target 203 meter Hill, Nogi’s men had finally found the crux to Port Arthur’s defenses. It was a terrible and bloody ordeal, but once 203 meter hill fell, the 3rd IJA were finally able to deploy their artillery in a position to smash the trapped Russian fleet. Now Port Arthur was back in Japanese hands and all that remained was Mukden.   #81 The Russo-Japanese War part 8: A stalemate at Shaho and Sandepu   Welcome to the Fall and Rise of China Podcast, I am your dutiful host Craig Watson. But, before we start I want to also remind you this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Perhaps you want to learn more about the history of Asia? Kings and Generals have an assortment of episodes on history of asia and much more  so go give them a look over on Youtube. So please subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry for some more history related content, over on my channel, the Pacific War Channel where I cover the history of China and Japan from the 19th century until the end of the Pacific War. Port Arthur had finally fallen and the forces of Kuropatkin were once again on the retreat. Kuropatkin sought to establish defenses at Tiehling as the area was more suitable to make a stand rather than the plains surrounding Mukden. Yet as had become customary, Alexeiev intervened stressing ‘the continued retreat to Tiehling will not prove favorable to the morale of the army’. The Russian forces were completely demoralized and the Hong Huzi became emboldened. The Chinese bandits struck at the fleeing Russian forces, particularly the Cossacks. Japanese officers were directing their efforts, trying to hit train carts full of supplies. Russian soldiers and officers were suffering from dysentery and venereal diseases, many also fell to the bottle. Kuropatkins numerical advantage would see be lost, as General Nogi’s 3rd IJA would soon come join the rest. Tsar Nicholas II decided to form a second Manchurian Army, under the command of General Oscar Casmirovitch Grippenberg. The man was more politician than soldier, he had not seen active service since the Crimean War, and even then only commanded a battalion. At the ripe age of 66, deaf and quite the hypochondriac, he came to Manchuria, and brought with him news of the motherland. St Petersburg was seeing more dissonance, the people were in rapid disorder, the overall feeling was that of revolution.  For the Japanese side, they were also licking their wounds. They had lost many men, and to remedy the loss of manpower they created a new ordinance on September 29th raising an additional 46,548 men to replace over 1/6th of their army that had fallen. Marshal Oyama looked to his logistics, preparing for the next engagement and probably did not expect what Kuropatkin did. Kuropatkin suddenly went on the offensive. Kuropatkin sent out these orders ‘I order the Manchurian Army entrusted to my command to attack the enemy in whatever position he may be occupying having as the main object to gain possession of the right bank of the Taitzu river.’ He scheduled an attack to be made on October 5th, shaking the Russian army out of their depression, to see if they could exact vengeance.  Grippenberg and his command and not yet arrived to the theater of war when Kuropatkin began his offensive plans. Grippenberg’s army consisted of the 6th and 8th Siberian corps, the 61st infantry division and a division of Don Cossacks. In the meantime, Alexeiev gave Kuropatkin the 6th Siberians. Despite the losses inquired upon his forces, at this time Kuropatkin still held superiority in numbers, with 261 battalions vs Oyama’s 170. At Mukden Kuropatkin had formed a bridgehead. To his south was the Taitzu river, to the east ran the Sha Ho. The railway line ran parallel to the old Mandarin Road. Around the Sha Ho area were hills and west of it many villages. The terrain east of the Mandarin road was mountainous, forcing infantry to be confined to pathways. Kuropatkin divided his forces in two forming western and eastern armies. Behind this were the general reserves, two flanks guards and a rearguard. The western force consisted of the 10th and 17th corps, with 4 regiments of Cossacks led by General Bildering. The Eastern Force consisted of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Siberian corps with a division of Cossacks under the command of Stakelberg. He ordered his army to advance along a 20 mile front through Pienniulupu to Penshihu. Within his reserves were the 4th Siberians and 1st European corps, the 6th Siberians made up the rearguard. The bulk of Kuropatkins front line force was east of the railway, but the west held more favorable ground for artillery and cavalry. The terrain to the east was less favorable for movement, yet Kuropatkin chose here to make his main thrust. Perhaps Kuropatkin planned to surprise the Japanese with such a bold move, yet it would not work.  Oyama’s forces had just been reinforced by a cavalry brigade who were occupying a narrow position going from the Coal Mines at Yentai to Santaitzu. Oyama sought to concentrate his forces as much as possible in the hopes an opportunity for an offensive would soon present itself. Oyama placed General Oku’s 2nd IJA on the left, General Nozu’s 4th IJA in the middle and Kuroki’s 1st IJA on the right. Within his reserve was the 12th division, near the right flanks rear. Oyama’s intelligence could not find two Russian corp locations, so he held back 3 Kobi brigades and a field artillery brigade in reserve at Liaoyang. 15 miles northeast in the mountains at Pienniulupu was Umezawa’s Kobi brigade scouting forward. Umezawa’s force were having a difficult time because of faulty maps. Kuropatkin was going to use his Western force to launch a holding attack, seeing two corps face off against the 2nd and 4th IJA. The disparity in strength was roughly 45,000 vs 72,000. Meanwhile the eastern force would perform the main assault with over 73, albeit under-strengthed battalions, numbering 50,000 or so. The 1st IJA would be roughly 40,000 strong. The first contact would be made in front of Umezawa’s position. Kuroki was convinced the main Russian assault was about to hit the northern area where Umezawa was, but Oyama was not convinced of this. Kuroki would turn out to be right, one of his patrols came across some documents on a dead Russian officer showcasing Stakelbergs offensive. When Oyama was presented with the evidence he immediately ordered a preemptive attack against the perceived main Russian thrust.  Umezawa pulled his brigade out of their position on the 7th of October, moving to Penhsihu. The Russians quickly seized Penhsihu by the 10th securing their right flank as Umezawa was forced to pull back further. Meanwhile the 5th IJA division’s advance was being hampered by a Russian regiment and the 2nd IJA were pushing the 17th corps further back. The Russians formed a new central group consisting of the 4th Siberian corps and a Cossack division led by Mischenko. This was done to plug up the gap created between the western and eastern forces. The Eastern forces were being bogged down heavily due to the mountainous terrain. Their communication line and maps were quite poor. Stakelberg was also being overly cautious in his movements, while Oyama would be quite simplistic in his orders. ‘I desire to drive the enemy at present east of the Mukden highway towards the north east.’ The result was the entire force, excluding the 12th division and Umezawa’s men, advancing 16 miles to a new line from Fengchipu to Kuanlinpu. The goal was to smash the Russian center with the 2nd, Guards, 10th and 5th divisions. The 4th IJA would wheel around the right while the 2nd IJA would attract the attention of the Russian right, drawing their reserves. On the morning of the 11th, the battle swayed back and forth in the mountains and around the villages over the plains. The Russians were having the soldiers go shoulder to shoulder upon features meeting the onslaught of attacks. Wherever it looked like the Japanese might break through, the Russian commanders screamed for reserves to come up. This caused a bit of confusion amongst so many reserve units being called forward. The Japanese used the night to gain momentum, sneaking around while the Russian artillery was less effective. On the night of the 11th, the 4th IJA were to perform their wheeling maneuver seeing the 10th division advance. At 1am the division surged forward with bayonets fixed, each man was wearing a black greatcoat over his khaki uniform. The men were also wearing white armbands, as a previous attack had gone disastrously when neither side could tell friend from foe. Apparently a Japanese commander had given his men orders “Japanese are short, foreigners are tall” it did not go well. The Russians had fortified a village and from its walls fired upon the incoming Japanese. The Japanese grabbed volunteers to breach the wall, 200 men set off for a “Kesshitai” known in english as forlorn hope attack. Most of the groups leaders were shot or bayoneted, but their sheer weight won the night. In one of the village houses the Japanese found a regimental commander. He was severely wounded and could hardly stand, but he refused to surrender. The Japanese night attack was a attempt to form a wedge between the Western force and central group, it achieved its objective at the cost of 60 officers and 1250 casualties. Most of these were of the 5th IJA division whose job was to wheel around the heart of the enemy’s position.  That night Stakelberg ordered his men to attempt a breach of the Japanese lines. Their first effort was directed at the Taling Pass, but they were easily swept aside as the Japanese had anticipated the attack. A second attempt was made and succeeded somewhat, but the Japanese were quick to counter attack. The Japanese seized the position back and the Russians were calling up more reserves in response. The next day, Kuropatkin lost the initiative to Oyama. Oyama had succeeded in bringing superior numbers to critical points. It was evident the 10th IJA division had suffered tremendous casualties, so the 5th IJA division was brought up. Now the Russian right wing, consisting of the 17th Corps, some 25,000 men would be hit by 3 Japanese divisions totaling 32,000.  Until this point, Kuropatkin had not committed 50,000 men and 250 guns of his reserve. The bulk of his 6th siberian and 1st European corps were untasked and the 2nd Siberians were basically stuck in limbo while Kuropatkin and Stakelberg kept a series of long distance messages unable to coordinate properly. Kuropatkin was patiently awaiting reports from Stakelbergs offensive in the east, hoping he would have a breakthrough. However the terrible maps and rough mountainous terrain were hampering all efforts. It was not just the terrain, Stakelberg was not the same officer who began the war in the east. Stakelberg was weary and demoralized. The 2nd cavalry brigade of Prince Kanin, reinforced with 1200 men began a southern advance against Stakelberg. The attack had the element of surprise and forced the cavalry divisions of Samsonov and Liubavin to pull out, exposing Rennenkampf’s infantry along the northern bank of the river. This action would force Stakelberg to order a retreat.  In the west, the 17th corps reinforced with a brigade of the 6th corps was exposed to attacks from the 2nd IJA. The 6th corps commander refused to assist. This left the 17th corps to fight it alone and they were severely defeated and forced to withdraw along their front. The 219th regiment, part of the 6th corps had just arrived at the scene and encountered the retreating men of the 139th and 140th regiments. Yet the 219th regiment kept advancing, unsupported by artillery, towards a position then occupied by 6 Japanese battalions and 11 batteries. Such was the communications failure at Sha Ho. The Japanese held their fire as the 219th advancing within 600 yards. The first experience of battle for the 219th would be the combined fire of 66 guns and thousands of rifles. They were blasted to pieces, they quickly routed leaving behind 22 officers and 832 men on the ground. A quarter of the regiment had been lost. The morning of the 13th saw the eastern group retreating. That same day saw the arrived of the 5th Kobi brigade, allowing Oyama to reinforce his depleted 12th division. Meanwhile the Guards division was in serious trouble as Stakelberg had tossed a counter attack their way. Luckily for the Guards, when they pulled back, so did the Russians, they did not pursue them at all. Oyama tossed all his remaining reserves to restore the equilibrium and hoped the added help would allow Kuroki’s 1st IJA to cut off the retreating eastern force. The Russians were gradually forming a full retreat. Bilderings western force found some breathing space as the 2nd IJA were nearing exhaustion. Oyama had no further reserves, the next reinforcements would be the 8th division arriving by train to Liaoyang. The Russian right flank was still holding firm, with their uncommitted guard led by Lt General Dembovski. Had his force of 16 squadrons and 32 guns been tossed into the mixed they perhaps could have severely hurt the 4th IJA division. Oyama then gave out new orders ‘to pursue the enemy as far as the left bank of the Sha river’. On the 14th the demoralized Russians were falling back through a rainy night. Again rain was saving the Russian’s withdrawal. At 7:20am Shahopu was lost by the 10th corps. The 10th corps were trying to hold a southern portion of the Sha river, but were gradually withdrawing. To try and stop them Kuropatkin sent 10 battalions with orders to attack southwards. That night the 10th corps withdrew leaving only 3 points to the south of the river within Russian hands. These were the village of Lamutun, One Tree Hill and Putilov Hill. Meanwhile the 6th corps launched an attack against the 4th IJA division. The attack went unsupported, as other nearby units were in disarray. The Russians advanced into a maelstrom of fire from the Japanese, nearly 2000 men were lost.  On the 15th Oyama issued another batch of orders ‘I intend to reform the Japanese armies on the left bank of the Sha Ho, in order to prepare to advance to the line of the Hun Ho.’ At the time, Oyama could not ford the Sha river while the Russians still held positions south of it. That day the Japanese seized Putilov Hill and Lamutun village, while Kuropatkin assembled a reserve nearing 30,000 men in strength. The next day, One Tree Hill was captured as General Gerngross took command of the enormous reserve group. Gerngross was ordered to recapture Putilov and One Tree Hill. These features were not large, nor very steep, sitting just south of the Sha river. At 5pm the Russian unleashed their artillery upon the Japanese occupiers, who quickly withdrew. General Putilov grabbed men to attack the hill that would soon bear his name as General Novikov with 3 regiment of the 1st European corps attacked One Tree Hill and the 36th east siberian rifle regiment would attack the Japanese right rear.  Novikov’s men advanced so quickly they caught some of the Japanese still withdrawing at One Tree Hill. This resulted in 4 Japanese companies making a nightly stand upon the hill to give their comrades time to get out. Meanwhile Putilov heard the sounds of battle from One Tree Hill and ordered his men to advance with haste. His force was met by a tremendous volley of gunfire from Japanese rearguards. Yet both features fell back into Russian hands and with it a boost to morale. The price was heavy, the Russians took 3000 casualties, while the Japanese had roughly 1000. Both sides then began to dig in, neither commander had secured his objective and thus the battle fell to stalemate. Winter was coming along as the men built vast trench networks. What has become known as the battle of Sha Ho was quite indecisive. The Russians suffered 41,550 casualties, the Japanese 39,769. In the face of what was somewhat a reversal in the campaign, Tsar Nicholas II recalled Alexeiev to St Petersburg and left Kuropatkin a free hand to plan his next move.  Finally rid of the troublesome Alexeiev was on one hand a great thing for Kuropatkin, it was however unfortunately far too late into the war. Kuropatkin was not in a good position and now he could not complain of the divided command issue to the Tsar, the responsibility was his and his alone. Winter was settling in, news of Port Arthur's fall and news of revolutionary fever back home was rampant amongst the troops. The Russians held a 100 mile long defense the Japanese could not outflank, but Kuropatkin knew Nogi’s 3rd IJA were enroute. Trains were carrying men and supplies from Port Arthur. Kuropatkin looked to his cavalry to better the situation “In order to induce the enemy to detach as many men as possible for their line of communications, and so weaken their front, to handicap their supply arrangements, and to stop the rail transport of Nogi’s units to the front, a raid by a mounted force was organised against their line of communications.“ Mischenko was put in charge of a 6000 strong cavalry unit alongside 6 batteries of light guns to perform a raid. His target was to seize Newchwang station where he hoped to achieve two objectives. 1) to destroy a large stockpile of foodstuff there and 2) to destroy a portion of the track between Tashihchiao and Kaiping. On January 12th Mischenkos force approached the main stores depot, normally guarded by just 500 Japanese. His cavalry advanced along the railway as his dragoons began cutting the line behind them. At 4pm a train approached from their rear with 16 trucks each carrying 30 Japanese. The train was coming extremely fast and steamed past them while also firing upon them. The depot was now garrisoned by 1000 Japanese who had well entrenched positions and knew the Russian cavalry were enroute. The mounted Cossacks made 3 charges against the Japanese lines, but could do little without infantry support. The Russian artillery failed to have enough effect and upon mounting casualties, Mischenko was forced to withdraw leaving behind 62 dead and 6 wounded. Meanwhile the dragoons cutting the railway line had no idea their force was defeated and were quickly brushed aside. Thus what could have been a brilliant raid saving the Russians valuable time, was a disaster. By January 18th, Grippenburg had arrived to take command of the 2nd Manchurian Army situated on the right of the Russian defensive line. In the center was the 3rd Manchurian army led by General Kaulbars. To the left was the 1st Manchurian army led by Linievich. Kuropatkin would issue orders 3 days before Russia’s 1905 bloody sunday at the winter palace. ‘Our primary object is to drive the enemy behind the Taitzu River and to inflict on him as much damage as possible.’ Kuropatkin was unleashing a full blown offensive, seeking to hammer the Japanese before Nogi could arrive to tip the scale. Though Mischenko’s raid failed horribly, it did bring Kuropatkin valuable intelligence, indicating Nogi was not yet within the theatre. The intelligence also indicated the Japanese left flank was quite vulnerable.  Grippenberg seized the initiative and began massively redeploying units on January 14-16th, this unfortunately fully showcased his intent to the Japanese. Kuropatkin would late write ‘These movements, of course, at once disclosed our intentions, and information soon came in that the enemy had, in their turn, commenced moving their troops westward and fortifying opposite our new dispositions.’ The most southern held position of the Russians was Changtau. Further south were the villages of Haikoutai and Sandepu, roughly 2 miles apart held and fortified by the Japanese. These villages held walls around 3 feet thick surrounded by open plains. The walls had been fitted with gun holes for machine guns that the Japanese made sure had good interlocking arcs of fire. The Russian advance began on the 25th, and the winter weather was dreadful. Grippenbergs army of 75,000 men marched across the frozen Hun river. The 1st Siberian corps of Stakelberg quickly seized Heikoutai, but at a tremendous cost of casualties. Meanwhile over at the left flank’s position at Sandepu, the Japanese had 4 divisions and were attacked by 7 divisions of Grippenberg. There was a state of confusion between the forces of Grippenberg and Kaulbars armies from the offset. Hampered by a lack of maps, literally working with sketches and facing blizzard conditions, Grippenergs 14th division shelled and occupied the neighboring hamlet of Paotaitzu by accident. A false report was soon dispatched to Kuropatkin indicating Sandepu had fallen. When Grippenberg realized his mistake, he ordered his heavy artillery to shell the actual target. His troops were exhausted from the offensive and weather, so Grippenberg gave them the a day's rest on the 27th, but the rest area was literally beside Sandepu, still held by the 5th IJA division. Stakelbergs men in the area were absolutely smashed by the Japanese who quickly attacked them. Stakelberg would lose roughly 6000 men before withdrawing during the night. On the night of the 28th, the bulk of Grippenbergs army was now separated from Kaulbars on either side of Sandepu village. The Russians launched attacks against Sandepu, but failed to make any progress. The Japanese held position was thwarted the two Russian armies ability to cooperate. Soon Kuropatkin learnt what was going on as Grippenberg requested reinforcements to continue his advance. Kuropatkin refused to reinforce Grippenberg and ordered him to pull back greatly irritated by the Grippenbergs insubordination. At the exact same time, Oyama ordered his armies to push the Russians past the Hun River. Thus when Grippenberg began to withdraw he was met with a massive Japanese offensive. Oyama described the action as such “‘We attempted several attack movements but suffered heavily from the enemy’s artillery, and especially from his machine guns, but all the columns continued the attack with all their might. Our forces charging into Heikoutai occupied the place firmly and entirely by half past nine.’” Kuropatkin had thus failed to achieve any of his objectives, the Sandepu debacle had cost him 20,000 casualties, the Japanese suffered 9000 casualties. Over a third of the Russian loses were incurred by Stakelbergs 1st Siberian corps, largely due to the commander refusing to comply with direct orders. As a result Stakelberg was removed from command and by January 30th, Grippenberg was asking to be relieved of command, stating he was gravely ill! Kuropatkin wrote “This action of his set a fatal example both to those under him and to the rest of the army, and was most harmful to all discipline. The opinions, also, that he had expressed to the effect that the campaign was virtually over, and that we should retire to Mukden and Harbin, had a dangerously disturbing effect on our weaker members. It was in the long run more harmful than any single defeat of a portion of our force would have been” As Grippenberg took his leave for St Petersburg, he stopped by Harbin and gave a report to the Novoe Vremya, it was quite a embellished account of what had occurred “Victory was in our hands, and I cannot tell you how anxiously I awaited men and authorisation to advance … On the night of the 29th we retired, carrying away all our wounded men, and even picking up broken bayonets. The men retired unwillingly with tears in their eyes. I decided that it was impossible for me to remain any longer at the front, and the next day I reported myself to General Kuropatkin, asking him to relieve me of my command immediately.” Thus Kuropatkin had finally been rid of the meddlesome Alexeiev, only to be severed with a megalomaniac commander who refused to listen to orders, such as Grippenberg. To make matters worse, Grippenberg, a senior general came back home and leaked such information to the official newspaper during a time in which revolution could break out at any moment. The mention of tens of thousands of Russian soldiers being killed in what was seen as a pointless war, drove the public's outrage further. The Times had this to report “They had been told that they would beat the Japanese as soon as they had them on the plain. After Liaoyang they were told that they would beat the Makaki (leatherskinned dwarfs) as soon as the kaoliang was cut and the little tricksters had to fight in the open. After the Sha Ho they were told that the Japanese could not bear the cold, and that they would never stand their ground in a winter engagement.” By February of 1905 the war had become 1 year old and the Russians had little to show for it. Meanwhile back home nearly 1000 people were dead or wounded from the events of Bloody Sunday. Disorder and looting broke out across St Petersburg. Strikes began to erupt outside the city in places like Batum, Tiflis, Baku, Kovno, Reval, Vilna, Riga, Warsaw and of course Moscow. Over 400,000 Russian workers refused to work in January of 1905 as Tsar Nicholas II attempted appeasing the peoples fever with a Duma. Soon that began to fail, the Tsar resorted to brute force to quell the strike movement. In the next few months an estimated 15,000 people were shot or hanged, 20,000 were beaten up and 45,000 would be sent into exile.  The attractive war was adding fuel to the fires of revolution within the Russian Empire. A weak aristocracy was barely holding on to its fledgling empire. The Tsar had initially saw the outbreak of war in the east to be a positive factor that would contribute to a raise of morale amongst the populace of Russia, but it was backfiring tremendously. Of course the revolutionary fever had more to do with other variables than an unpopular war, but what would happen if Russia lost the war?  I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me. General Grippenberg did not turn out to be a great replacement for Alexeiev. Kuropatkin struggled to toss any offensive he could to break Oyama’s armies before General Nogi’s 3rd IJA arrived at the theatre of war. Now all that remained was Mukden and with it Russia’s hope of holding onto Manchuria.