To restore the Republic (Nationalist China)

[General Guisan]

Preamble:

This will be about the Restauration of the Chinese republic in it's 1914 boarders (Plus Tsingtao and Formosa):

The settings used will be normal difficulty, the CCIP mod running under AoD (adding some more realism for China), no IC takeover, no techteam takeover, newest AoD release 1.04. I'll use Military control over minor allies (only), should the need arise. Comments from the player will be in italic

Plans are, besides restoring all land the Republic once owned, to restore it's democratic system which was more and more replaced by a right-wing gouvernment under Generalissimo Chiang Kai-Shek in the late 20s and 30s. As hard times requires hard measures, this however might have to wait a while.

The Whampoa Military Academy, which is at the moment getting some support from the German gouvernment, will provide the recruits for the urgently needed modernisation for the Chinese National Army.

We take whatever support we can get - Japanese troops occupying Manchuria already, and rumors are they want to march on Beiping soon.

CCIP adds 7 divisions into the queue, representing the already working Whampoa Academy. I won't be able to run them at much speed, as dissents are massive to start with, and I'm barely having any free ICs at all.

The Chinese army at the start of 1936 is consisting of mostly outdated infantery, some local militias and the core of the new army is not yet operating, only 10.000 men are equipped with newest, German-standard weaponery.

This core will have to be expanded as quickly as possible, so that it becomes a force to lead all Chinese regular units into battle, as it won't be possible to put up the whole army to modern standards in short time. Alexander von Falkenhausen will be responsible to aid our own commanders with this modernisation attempt. He's to be trusted as one of the few foreigners for now, despite what his gouvernment is standing for.

We're currently at war with the Communists under Mao Zedong, which are dug into the mountains of western Shaanxi. While we've many times their numbers, their fighting spirit, commanders and equipment is superior to ours.

We're on friendly terms with most of the warloards spread across China, mostly due to our army being superior to theirs. Guangxi, in the South around Guangzhou province, are having some strong formations, and we hope to have them on our side in case a full war breaks out.

Troops from the coastline are moving inland to fight the Communists, which needs to be eliminited first, shall our goal to unite China under our gouvernment succeed.

War will come soon, but will it be over soon too?

 

[quaazi]

Sweet, following. Are you gonna take down Yunnan before marco polo?

 

[General Guisan]

Economic overview and the first war against the Communists

The biggest issues we're having currently is our sky high dissent as well as low IC and low manpower. The last one will get better rather easily, while the first two will take longer. Our military academy provides us with an endless amount of recruits, unfortunately we won't be able to use it to it's full amount till (too?) late.

Some funds are put into reducing our massive amount of dissents, but funding has to stay rather low given our limited ressources. No toys "Made in US" for you, Chinese children, I'm afraid.

Research will be funded, but again, at limited amount. I'm sure Falkenhausen can make the best of it.

The bulk of our army, especially all our regular forces, are heading towards Xi'an and the region around it. We expect Communist forces to advance a bit as our current forces at the frontline are rather week.

The cold weather certainly won't help us, while their experienced troops might advance much faster. Peace has to be achieved soon, as victory seems impossible. For now.

As expected, Communist troops have made some gains as our troops couldn't hold the initial frontline. Xi'an, the most important city at the border, could be hold, which is good. Loosing Lanzhou was deemed unfortunate, but we didn't had the ressources to try to hold it.

As Mao wanted apparently peace as well, he took our president Chiang Kai-Shek as hostage while he was in Xi'an, observing our troop performance.
We agreed to peace talks, and soon got the lost land back in exchange for ending the hostility.

While most people were expecting our troops marching towards the coast again, our president had a different plan.. just as the first recruits of the New Chinese army finish training..

quaazi: Yunnan, Shaanxi and Guangxi have rather strong troops. Taking them might cost a lot, compared to forge the United Front. It is an option, though.

 

[General Guisan]

War versus Western Warloards wanted

As soon as the frozen ground in the west begun to crack, Chinese troops marched through the friendly area of Xibei San Ma, reaching soon the region where the Pro-Russian warlord regime of Sinkiang had been established.

A bit later, troops were marching towards the region of Tibet, where monks had established their own rule after the Chinese Empire was removed from the map in 1912. They shall be reincorporated into the growing Chinese republic, now!

The war against Sinkiang went smoothly, with barely any resistance stoping our troops from freeing this vital link to central asia. Tibet, however, had built an quite strong army, which surprised our advancing troops during the first assault. We later found out why, maps drawn in their headquarter in Lhasa showed they had set up plans to conquer parts of India, Yannan and Xibei San Ma. Those armies must have been prepared for their own wars yet to come. It will never happen. After publishing those plans to the press, massive public support for those wars was gained. Our press officer certainly did a good job.

While those wars were little noticed in the western world, our main armies assembled South of Shanxi. 41 divisions, as well supplied as possible, stood ready for orders.

The rest of our army stood ready towards the coastline, either directly guarding the most easy to land beaches, or in the hinterland as reserves. 13 armies should defend our precious coastal cities in total.

Summer came, and Japan sent massive amounts of fresh, additional troops to Northern China. We had clear treaties with them. Especially the younger Chinese demanded an end to those humilations.

Especially the warlords of the South demanded an United Chinese front against the Japanese invadors. As a civil war over how we shall react on this break of the treaty we had was about to start, Chiang Kai-Shek agreed with the demands from the strongest warlord, the Southern Guangxi. They agreed to put their troops and land under central Chinese administration, if the first action for them will be to march northwards, towards the Japanese positions.

The former Guangxi armies, now under direct control from Nanjing:

While a few of them will have the nice job of guarding the beaches of Southern China, most of them are already on their way towards Nanjing and further North.

Only days after Guangxi agreed to be added into our Nation, Japan found out about our plans and reacted. Well, seems war was here, and it won't be over soon again. For the moment, Yann'an and the Communists stay neutral.. if we want to win this conflict, we will need more allies on the battlefield.

For China, advance!

 

[Timmie0307]

Go China..!

 

[unmerged(166917)]

A Nationalist China AAR, great, I'm in.
Teach the Japanese a lesson that we'll never forget !

 

[Akaki]

What's the point in DOWing Sinkiang & Tibet? Lots of dissent for 10 IC and long march towards their capitals... You're playing CCIP, you'll get all the warlords later.

 

[General Guisan]

The war against Japan starts.. it shall not end soon

The moment Chiang Kai-Shek was informed about the Japanese marching into Shanxi, he was on his way. Leading a small but formidable army into battle, he was confident that victory is possible.

First bigger battle occured when japanese troops attacked Tianjin. After a few hours of heavy fighting, the troops from Shanxi had to retreat.

With numbers three times the available troops from Japan towards Manchuria, we're confident to throw them out quick and liberate Manchuria in a quick war from japanese rule.

But unfortunately, Japan seems to have some friends in China too. Mao you traitor! We shall not forget! Tricky Communists.. I did have a peacy treaty with them till late '37, but they didn't had a peacy treaty with Shanxi, allowing them to declare war on our alliance

Still hoping to be able to quickly win over Japan while the Communists weren't yet ready for an offensive, Chiang pushed further Northwards.

While still on the way, news have arrived that the United States will support us with ressources. They call it the Pitman Act. First factories get moved to the interior of China, to protect from Japanese bombers, or even worse, invading troops. We can't be too cautious now.

On the way to Tianjin we're spotting retreating units from Shanxi. Upon making contact, they're much more optimistic and turn around, to support us.

And indeed, victory! With japanese looses almost as bad as ours, this is a major victory. The new German equipment and training seems to be paying off.

Japan finds new allies.. too bad for them they shall soon be over, as our troops are already only days away from Lhasa.

By early July, our troops have sent the Japanese back to their initial positions, now getting ourselves into the offense. 70 divisions from Shanxi and us are driving the invaders back. Falkenhausens orders are clear: Vorwärts immer, Rückwärts nimmer! 永遠向前，永遠落後！

Under the command of our army leader, our troops attack Changde north of Beiping with force. Superior equipment and leadership together with more men make up for the lack of organisation we're still suffering.

At Jining, the japanese defenders take even higher causalties then we do, clearly we're on the offensive now.

Will our attack against Manchuria be victorious before the Communists can mount an offensive? We're pressing hard against the Japanese to indeed make quick victory possible. Mao will pay for his treachery at the Chinese people.

Long live the Republic! 共和國萬歲！

Timmie0307: Thanks
Karaiskandar: I hope they won't forget.. it will get more bloody soon
Akaki: The problem is, when staying at peace I need quite some upkeep. As I do have high dissent anyway, I prefer stay at war, it's easier to reduce dissent. That's only half the truth of course, the other half is that Tibet is NOT given by events and Sinkiang as much as I'm aware is less willing to give in than the other warlords. They're also the only two warlords which I can beat with the troops from Xibei San Ma, all my own troops are already at the frontline against Japan. Plus, having some "free" IC will help a lot in case the Japanese manage to conquer my coastline provinces..

 

[unmerged(216158)]

Yes

Nat. China is best china but Go For 19th century borders!

 

[unmerged(166917)]

Good progress so far.
I don't see how the Japanese could stop you.
Of course a bad surprise (like a landing somewhere in the South) is still definitely possible.

 

[unmerged(191057)]

China for chinese!

 

[Akaki]

It's easy to defeat Japan in '36 - they still have 1918 infantry then, while China (having almost full free market & hawk lobby) can easily spam lots of '36 infantry...

 

[unmerged(189717)]

Why does he have 1936 INF? Shouldn't he have to research that first?

 

[General Guisan]

Tactical front-shortening (don't call it retreat)

While our troops rushed forward against the Japanese, the liberation army from Xibei San Ma managed to liberate Lhasa and thus make them part of the Chinese Republic. As the fleeing monks had set all their factories on fire, it will take several months to recover the local industry, unfortunately.

On the sky above Wuhu, a japanese bomber squadron is intercepted by the Republican airforce, shooting down over 20 bombers while only loosing 3 airplanes. This hopefully will show the japanese that they won't be able to bomb our forces at will from the air.

Early August, things have started to become worse. While we're still pushing the japanese backwards, our advance has slowed down a lot, and they're rapidly rushing reinforcements from both Manchuria as well as from Korea and Japan. And, what really bother us even more, is that the troops we've sent to stop the Communist offensive are hopelessly beaten back, sometimes when even enjoying 2:1 superiority in numbers. We need to make a decision, quick. Reserves, which were guarding the beaches are throwed against the Communists. Lets hope the Japanese won't notice too quick.

As we decide to leave our costline around Shanghai-Tsingtao almost undefended, we're moving further factories inland. This will lead to a temporary reduction in available production capacity, but might prove valuable in case we indeed can't hold the provinces.

The battle for Changde still isn't won, and while we keep throwing the enemy back, they keep feeding the meat grinder with fresh troops. Unfortunately, well equiped troops. Motivated troops. Organised troops. At the same time, our offensive against the Communists with the former beachguards isn't really successfull either, as we only manage to stop them, but not gain any land back.

We finally can't continue our offensive against Changde and need to stop the attack. While it technically wasn't successfull, we've managed to inflict 5 times the causalities on them that we had to suffer Not sure how this came.. I think they used "Death or Valhalla to keep their frontline, as they probably knew just as I did that loosing Changde would be a major disaster for them

Now the news get worse every day. Imperial japanese troops are landing close to Shanghai, with our garnison there unable to stop them. We order them to retreat but as communication to Shanghai got interrupted, they decide to better run and try to hide in the countryside. The division commander later should describe it as "panic".

Further japanese landings all along the coast, happening at the same time than Shanghai but unopposed, make our situation even worse. The few forces we're still having in this area are heading towards Xuzhou, to reorganise into something like an army. We're getting desperate. While we can keep the Japanese for the moment in Shanxi, we can neither push back the Communists nor fight the landings. And rumors from the South aren't better either...

Van5: I try to get whatever I've cores on.. or will get cores on.. other regions will get friendly gouvernments, if I succeed ever marching over the boarders of China
Karaiskandar: This AAR is slightly non-impartial. Early successes were "lightly" boosted. The japanese got WAY more than I have.

Zeldar155: .. and Chinese friends. We aren't fighting alone

Akaki: I'm still somewhere in the middle between Dove&Hawk, and free market doesn't help much. I can't upgrade my divisions, as I'm lacking the '36 tech so far. I can only produce '36 infantery as this is to represent the Whampoa academy with German support. As all but 1 division are either '18 or militia, I'm bound for quite a bit of time to fight it out with outdates equipment. When supplies and money has to be produced, I can only build 1-2 divisions at the same time.. I think when war against Japan broke out, I had like 4 or 5 '36 divisions ready. I'm NOT playing a perfectionst game here, rather my first full '36 campaign with AoD under 1.04 and CCIP.

Leonaru: I'm starting with 1 '36 div and 7 queues with them (see above, Whampoa) - my regular army is '18 inf and militia, which I can't upgrade for a while. And I'm lacking IC anyway to do so. And, to make things even worse, China starts with 0 land doctrines. You shall see in a later upgrade which path I decided to take. Won't be too surprising I guess. Will take quite long time till I get my first tech.. my techteams are REALLY bad, and I only get 2 slots..

Thanks everyone for commenting so far

 

[unmerged(166917)]

Oh I had been overly enthusiastic, the IJA will be a tough nut to crack.
The landings are quite worrying.

 

[unmerged(216158)]

I too forgot that the Japanese still have fought!

For the Middle kingdom... I mean republic

 

[General Guisan]

Regroup or retreat

Situation became grimmer every day. News from the North had the Japanese starting more and more offensives, while landing after landing was reported from the Tsingtao-Shanghai line. Anything not declared absolutely needed to defend Guangzhou and Hainan ports was sent North, mostly by foot. We'll need all available train capacity to mount our next offensive against the Japanese right now.

With the first battles, our troops gain some experience and we're gaining the theoretical knowledge of updating our existing equipment into newer weaponery that our German advisors are already equipping us with. It will takes ages, with our low infrastructure, to organise any meaningfull updates.

To be able to quickly shift troops from one Schwerpunkt to another, we're trying to make some further progress on the supply front. Not that we know what a Schwerpunkt is, yet.

At the middle of August, Nanjing became impossible to defend. Quickly, all what was possible was evacuated westwards on the river, while our armies were assembling in Xuzhou. While our numbers are even to the Japanese troops in this sector, our quality isn't. Mostly militias, those troops will only be able to withstand the invaders for hours, if at all.

Only light resistance was possible when the Japanese Imperial army attached our capital Nanjing. And then the japanese brute went mad, killing around 300.000 of our civilians, raping much more, some only small girls and old women, burning down many parts of the historic city. It was a sad day for China, but it showed the Chinese people: If they want to survive as a nation, they need to unite to stop the Japanese brute! It's now, or never!

With the news of the Nanjing massacre spreading around our country and ultimately the world, the motivation for our troops skyrocketed Finally no dissents - and as troops who were on the retreat from Shanxi became available, it was time to turn the tide. Very much about time. The communists were finally stopped. The Japanese need to be stopped now. Any further gain for them will be the nail in our coffin.

With our troops concentrating some of their strength on the Communists, they learned it wasn't all so easy, and quickly offered peace. We accepted it, for now. They'll pay for their treason, with blood. In time.

As we had to abandon our Northern front to stop Mao, the warlords of Shanxi didn't had any ground to rule over, and soon handed over anything they had left to the National army. Those troops will have to fight with their uniforms, for the moment, as we can't afford to produce anything but bullets in our few factories now.

A month after Nanjing fell, we've managed to stop the Japanese on most frontlines. Strong resistance in Datong mountains are forcing the Japanese to keep strong troops in the North, putting Xi'an out of danger and allowing us to mount a counter-offensive against recently lost Xuzhou. Some japanese troops managed to advance more inland along the Jangtse river, but local militias are causing havoc in their supply lines as the news of the brutal invadors massacre are spreading through the countryside further.

Sorry for the long time no update - work unfortunately always uses the green "priority" star to cheat
Van5: They are strong.. but they can't beat us.. eventually
Karaiskandar: I gambled in being able to kick the Japs out of Manchuria - unfortunately with AoD this isn't possible that easy anymore as battle takes much longer and time is always on japanese side. Then, without a quick victory, even 2 inf+1 mil guarding the beaches isn't enough - the AI does 3-4 simultanious landings, disabling any "shift" ability of forces if you don't keep strong mobile forces around - which I simply don't have

 

[unmerged(216158)]

It has returned!

for the Middle Republic !

 

[unmerged(189717)]

Forward!

 

[unmerged(166917)]

Good news, the peace with the commies should free enough divisions to counter the Japanese advance towards inner China.