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August Storm)
Operation August Storm was the codename for the Soviet invasion of Manchukuo, Mengjiang, Korea, the southern portion of Sakhalin, the Kuril Islands, and Hokkaido; it would be the initial action of the Soviet Union against the Empire of Japan, as, at the Yalta Conference, it had agreed to enter the Second World War's Pacific theatre within three months of the end of the war in Europe. The invasion began on August 8, 1945, precisely three months after the German surrender on May 8. It occurred in violation of a neutrality pact with Japan, and, notably, between the drops of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima (August 6) and Nagasaki (August 9).
Combatant forces
The Soviets
The Far Eastern Command, under Marshal A. M. Vasilevsky, conducted the massive attack. It consisted of three Red Army fronts:
- Trans-Baikal Front (aimed at Mengjiang and western Manchukuo), including:
- 17th Army.
- 36th Army.
- 39th Army.
- 53d Army.
- 6th Guards Tank Army.
- Cavalry-Mechanized Group.
- 12th Air Army .
- First Far Eastern Front (aimed at eastern Manchukuo), including:
- 2d Red Banner Army.
- 15th Army.
- 16th Army.
- 10th Air Army.
- Second Far Eastern Front (aimed at northern Manchukuo), including:
- 1st Red Banner Army.
- 5th Army.
- 25th Army.
- 35th Army.
- Chuguevsk Operational Group.
- Amur River Flotilla.
Each front had ‘front units’ attached directly to the front instead of an army [1]. The forces totaled at least eighty divisions with 1.5 million men, over five thousand tanks (including 3,700 T-34s), over 28,000 artillery pieces and 4300 aircraft (including 3,700 first line combat aircraft). Approximately one-third of its strength was in combat support and services. Its naval forces contained 12 major surface combatants, 78 submarines, numerous amphibious craft, and the Amur river flotilla, consisting of gunboats and numerous small craft. It incorporated all the experience in maneuver warfare that the Soviets had acquired fighting the Germans.
The Japanese
The Kwantung Army of the Imperial Japanese Army under General Otsuzo Yamada, was the Japanese force opposing them. It was the major part of the Japanese occupation forces in Manchuria and Korea, and it consisted of two Area Armies and three independent armies:
- First Area Army (northeastern Manchukuo), including:
- Third Area Army (southwestern Manchukuo), including:
- Independent units
- 4th Army (an independent field army responsible for northern Manchuria)
- 34th Army (an independent field army responsible for the areas between the Third and Seventeenth Area Armies)
- Kwangtung Defence Army (responsible for Mengjiang)
- Seventeenth Area Army (responsible for Korea; assigned to the Kwantung Army in the eleventh hour, to no avail)
Each Area Army (the equivalent of a Western "army") had headquarters units and units attached directly to the Area Army, in addition to the field armies (the equivalent of a Western corps). In addition to the Japanese there was the forty thousand strong Manchukuo Defense Force , composed of eight under-strength, poorly-equipped, poorly-trained Chinese divisions. Korea, which would have been the next target for the Far Eastern Command, was garrisoned by the Seventeenth Area Army.
The Kwantung Army had over six hundred thousand men in twenty-five divisions (including two tank divisions) and six Independent Mixed Brigades. These contained over 1,215 armored vehicles (mostly armored cars and light tanks), 6,700 artillery pieces (mostly light), and 1,800 aircraft (mostly trainers and obsolete types).
The Imperial Japanese Navy contributed nothing to the defense of Manchuria, which it was against in the first place. The bulk of the Japanese forces were far below authorized strength, and most of its heavy equipment had been transferred to the Pacific Campaign. The result was that the Kwantung Army had become, basically, a light infantry counter-insurgency force with limited mobility and experience. Manchuria had the bulk of usable industry and raw materials for the Japanese in China. Japanese forces were no match for the Red Army, which had vastly superior equipment, material, and military tactics by that time. It also contained a large number of raw recruits. Per Army Headquarters, Korea was given priority defense and the army was oriented along the northern and eastern borders of Manchura with only limited outposts along the western border.
The campaign
The operation was carried out as a classic double pincer envelopment over an area the size of Western Europe. In the western pincer, Soviet forces advanced over the deserts and mountains from Mongolia, far from their resupply railways; this confounded the Japanese military analysis of Soviet logistics, and the Japanese were thus caught by complete surprise and in unfortified positions. At the same time, airborne units were used to seize airfields and city centers in advance of the land forces; they were also used to ferry fuel to those units that had outrun their supply lines.
The Japanese commander was missing for the first eighteen hours of conflict, and communication was lost with forward units very early on.
The fighting only lasted for about a week before Japan's Emperor Hirohito read the Gyokuon-hōsō on August 15, and declared a ceasefire in the region the next day; Soviet forces were already penetrating deep into Manchukuo by that time. They continued their now largely unopposed advance into Manchukuo's territory, reaching Mukden, Changchun and Qiqihar by August 20. At the same time, Mengjiang was invaded by the Red Army and her Mongol allies, with Guihua soon taken.
On August 18, several amphibious landings had been conducted ahead of the land advance: three in northern Korea, one in Sakhalin, and one in the Kuril Islands. This meant that, in Korea at least, there were would be already Soviet soldiers waiting for the troops coming overland. In Sakhalin and the Kurils, it meant a sudden and undeniable establishment of Soviet sovereignty.
The land advance was stopped a good distance short of the Yalu River, the beginning of the Korean peninsula, when even the aerial supply lines became unavailable. The forces already in Korea were able to establish a bit of control in the peninsula's north, but the ambition to take the entire peninsula was cut short when American forces landed at Incheon on September 8, six days after the signing of the Japanese Instrument of Surrender.
Hokkaido was never invaded as planned.
Results
Operation August Storm, along with the two atomic bombings on Honshu, likely combined to break the Japanese political deadlock and force Japan's surrender, since they made it clear that Japan had no hope of even holding out in the home islands.
As agreed at Yalta, the Soviets had intervened in the war with Japan within three months of the German surrender, and they were, as thus, entitled to the territories of Sakhalin, the Kuril Islands, and also to pre-eminent interests over Port Arthur and Dairen, with its strategic rail connections. With the exception of Dairen, which was given to the full control of the People's Republic of China in 1955, the other possessions are still administered by the most powerful of the Soviet Union's successor states, the Russian Federation.
Though the north of the peninsula was under Soviet control, the economic machine driving the invasion forces had given out before the entire peninsula could be seized. With the American forces landing at Incheon, some time before the Red Army could have remobilized and secured the entire nation, Korea was effectively divided. This was a precursor to the later Korean War.
Relevant military history
See also
External links
