Chapter Seventy-five: Switching Tracks
(April 1946 – Eastern Hemisphere)
AuthAAR’s Note: After reviewing the Eastern Front and the Americas last time, we round out the April 1946 reports with the Middle East (mainly Iran and Georgia) and Asia.
Polish troops operating in the harsh hills and mountains of eastern Iran, April 1.
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Iran and the Caucasus: 1-17 April 1946
As March 1946 ended, another new rail project was commenced in Iran – a branch line to supply front line troops in Kerman.
The last Polish division to pull out of Indochina – the seasoned veterans of 16 DP – made port in Kota Bharu safely late on 2 April. They would head across country to Kuala Lumpur to evade the most dangerous waters around Malaya and resume their voyage to Iran from there.
And in north-western Iran, the British defence of Yasuj was in a bad way by the morning of 5 April and other Allied defences looked a bit thin.
Yasuj would fall to the Soviets two days later, on 7 April. At that time, three more Polish divisions had arrived from Western China and had recovered enough organisation to begin heading to the front in Kerman.
By the beginning of 9 April, the loss of Yasuj had helped push Iran even closer to capitulation
[74%]. Later that day, 16 DP set sail from Kuala Lumpur, making to the head of the Persian Gulf.
In Georgia, the Allies had expanded their Black Sea beachhead by 10 April and were advancing north and east as the scarce Georgian SSR and Soviet forces were pushed back.
By 13 April, the Poles were ready for their next attack in eastern Iran. This quick attack would last just three hours before the weakened Soviet defences crumbled. Better generalship, tactics and poor Soviet supply were enough to outweigh the enemy’s air sup[port advantage. Though not before the attacking Poles lost a couple of hundred men.
Years of fighting in Western China had ensured General Żeligowski was an adaptable commander and an expert mountain fighter well suited to leading in the current conditions.
Another attack would be required a day later as the Soviets slipped another division into the north of Kerman, delaying Polish occupation of the tough terrain.
Up in Georgia, more Allied troops had arrived in Batumi by the 15th, as the enemy also started to muster thin defensive lines to the east and west of the bridgehead.
While in Armenia the long-surrounded Allied army in Yerevan was still holding out quite strongly, while simultaneously trying to break out to the east.
By that time, the first four divisions of the previous Polish ‘Indochina Corps’ had arrived at the head of the Persian Gulf, just south of Ahvaz, and were part way through their post-voyage reorganisation. Two days later they were ‘ready enough’ to be sent up to the beleaguered Allied front, where the Soviets were pushing on Ahvaz from the north and had secured Yasuj.
Asia: April 1946
Poland’s involvement in Western China had now been significantly scaled back but other events there were still being tracked. By 9 April, the Allied forced trapped in central Manchuria were being compressed and the Manchurian Federated State was on the brink of capitulation
[89%].
By 12 April, the PLA had advanced to the outskirts of Dalian, the last mainland Manchurian port in Allied hands. There was now a significant risk that even the Allied troops in the smaller coastal pocket would be isolated without hope of evacuation.
To the north, the larger Hsinking Pocket was being constricted by the PLA from the west and the Soviets from the east. It was now just a matter of time before they were destroyed or captured.
On Okinawa however (a Manchurian outpost) the Allies were trying - with difficulty - to force the Japanese landing back north.
And in Indochina, the Allied line in central Vietnam had collapsed, with MAB forces advancing south on a wide front while the only delay was being imposed by British and German troops on the Laotian border.
Dalian had fallen by the end of 14 April, with an Allied counter-attack trying to regain it from the advance guard the of tired PLA troops that had just occupied it. The PLA would ultimately push more troops into Dalian and the Allied attack would fail; and with it their last hopes of evacuation.
After Hsinking fell on 18 April, the Manchurians initiated separate peace talks with the PRC and surrendered just after midnight. This further depleted and isolated the three Allied troop pockets making their forlorn last stands.
The Manchurians had lost over 400,000 men in this latest war, principally to the PRC and USR. A total of over 30 Allied divisions remained trapped in the Manchurian pockets. Later that day, all southern pockets in Manchuria had been eliminated and only the northern one remained.
In Sinkiang, resistance remained strong as the Poles and Britain continued to resist large enemy attacks in Yarkand, inflicting heavy casualties on the Soviets during two major (and a few smaller) battles in April.
By the afternoon of 21 April, the perimeter in the last Allied pocket in Manchuria had been reduced to a single province, with a number of British divisions trying to retreat into it.
This resistance would not last must longer and the last Allied troops in Manchuria would surrender shortly afterwards.
Whereas in Sinkiang and north-western China the Allies were in a far stronger position.
At month’s end, the PRC, USR and Mongolia had divided up their occupation zones in Manchuria. The Allies continued to resist with mixed success in Western China and held strong and were even attacking in places in the north-west.
The situation in Indochina continued to deteriorate.
Okinawa had been cleared of the last Japanese and remained under the control of the Manchurian government in exile, where the Manchurian (ex-Kwantung, ex-Japanese) fleet was also holed up.
But an earlier Japanese invasion of Taiwan had progressed rapidly and its armies were now approaching the undefended Manchurian provisional capital of Taipei.
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Iran and the Caucasus: 18-30 April 1946
The Poles were in position to counter-attack the Soviets in Khuzestan by 19 April and had inflicted a sharp defeat on them by early non the 20th. That afternoon, they were advancing to reoccupy the province, while their comrades to the south were advancing the support the Allied defence of the southern approaches to Yasuj.
In Georgia, the Allies had expanded their beachhead a little and landed five more divisions in Batumi but the Soviets were beginning to muster more forces to scramble a defensive line. This would no doubt start to slow the Allied advance but it was clearly diverting troops from other fronts, which was something useful.
In eastern Iran, the new Polish-funded rail link was finished in Kerman and a new short branch line was being laid to support the Allied advance northwards.
With fresh divisions beginning to reach the front, the Poles attacked again in Kerman on the morning of 21 April and had defeated the defenders after a five-hour skirmish. A few hours later, they had repelled the Soviet attack this spoiling assault was aimed at.
South-east Khuzestan was retaken the same day and a hasty Soviet counter-attack defeated by the afternoon. The arrival of the Poles south of Yasuj had also ended the Soviet attack there.
The Caucasus remained prominent, with a temporary status quo in Georgia and the ongoing defence of the Allied forces surrounded in Yerevan, which was tying up at least 8 4thInt divisions.
The attack on Yasuj was ready by late morning on the 23rd with all four Polish divisions participating. It would succeed after a day of heavy fighting.
As had happened a number of times in the past, in Kerman the KBK had outrun its infantry support in taking the recently won ground there and were under strong Soviet counter-attack by early on the 24th. They were withdrawn soon afterwards rather than suffer further drastic casualties.
At that time, supply was good in the west around Ahvaz but still poor to the east.
Yasuj had been retaken and a Soviet attack defeated by the afternoon of 28 April. Earlier that day, 1 and 26 DPs (which had not advanced into Yasuj) had mounted a new attack west of Isfahan earlier that day, with victory coming at midday and reoccupation two days later. The impact of the four veteran Polish divisions in this sector had been telling so far.
In the east, the follow-up Polish infantry divisions had secured the newly one ground in Kerman by that time. Recently arrived Polish divisions to their east had launched a new attack on the regional town of Birjand at 0500hr on the 28th.
That attack would succeed by mid-afternoon, the victory coming at the same time as a defence of south-western Kerman.
As April ended, 16 DP was approaching the entrance to the Persian Gulf on its long and uneventful voyage from Kuala Lumpur. More widely, the European and Middle Eastern fronts remained broadly balanced in an operational sense.
The air situation in the theatre showed the 4thInt had air superiority in the Caucasus and supremacy over Iran at present.
The Allies had further widened their beachhead and seemed to still be shipping in reinforcements to Batumi, but heavy Soviet forces were now gathering to the north.
The situation around Yerevan and northern Kurdistan was getting tricky as supply ran out for the surrounded Allies and no relief effort seemed to be near to reaching them.
In Iran, the Polish interventions were having perceptible outcomes. In the west, the dangerous advance on Ahvaz had been halted, Yasuj retaken and, if the current Soviet attacks could be well defeated, the retaking of Isfahan might even be on the cards in May.
And in the east, a slow pushback in Kerman was showing promising signs, with Birjand on the point of liberation. While Iran now hovered near the edge of capitulation, there remained some hope they could be saved from Communist takeover.
