From the September 18 Incident in 1931 to the complete victory of the Anti-Japanese War in August 1945, 14 years have passed. In the course of 14 years, how many troops did Japan send to the Chinese battlefield? In fact, such a question is very controversial, after all, with the full-scale outbreak of the Anti-Japanese War, the Japanese army has not made a breakthrough in the Chinese battlefield for a long time, so it turned its attention to Southeast Asia and invested a large number of troops in the Southeast Asian battlefield, which increased the difficulty of post-war statistics. However, the Japanese side still gave a rough statistical range, that is, from the beginning of Japan's transfer of troops to the Chinese battlefield until the end of the war, a total of 168 divisions and regiments were established, with a total strength of up to 5 million people!
Although I saw the statistics given by the Japanese side, these 168 divisions and regiments, with a total of 5 million troops, were not all sent to the Chinese battlefield, and a large part of them were sent to the Pacific theater. Nowadays, only the troops sent to the Chinese battlefield are counted, so out of the total number of 168 divisions and regiments, 105 divisions and regiments have come to the Chinese battlefield, and their total strength is as high as 3 million.
If we count the troops stranded after the war, then after the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, only 53 divisions and regiments were still stranded in China, and their total strength was only 1.09 million. In fact, the reason why there is such a big difference in the statistics is that the 14 years of the Anti-Japanese War have been roughly counted as a whole, and no specific time nodes have been distinguished. In the 14 years of the Anti-Japanese War, from the Japanese invasion of the Northeast to the full-scale War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression, the number of troops was increasing, especially after 1938, with the arrival of the stalemate stage, Japan had to continue to increase troops on the Chinese battlefield, so that the total strength of the Japanese army increased rapidly from about 1 million before the outbreak of the Anti-Japanese War to about 2.6 million.
From 1938 to 1941, although it was hailed as the most difficult years of the Anti-Japanese War, the total strength of the Japanese army was maintained at a maximum of 2.6 million men. After all, during the most difficult period of the Anti-Japanese War, the Chinese army and civilians needed to face the three-dimensional offensive of the Japanese army alone.
After 1941, the Japanese army increased its troops in the Chinese theater, bringing the total strength to about 3.5 million. The reason why the Japanese army will continue to increase its troops is mainly because the Japanese army wants to use China as a springboard to start a rapid invasion of Southeast Asia and ignite the war throughout the Pacific region.
It was precisely out of the consideration of expanding the scale of the battlefield that the Japanese army began to continuously increase its troops to the Chinese battlefield, but it could send some elite troops to Southeast Asia to fight, so that the actual number of troops remaining on the Chinese battlefield was only about 300-3.15 million. At most, more than 3 million troops were invested in the Chinese battlefield, which made the main force of the Japanese army fall into the quagmire of the Chinese battlefield for a time, so how many Japanese troops were eliminated in the Chinese battlefield?
First of all, let's take a look at the data released by the Japanese side, the total number of casualties of the troops is as high as 2.13 million, of which only about 750,000 were killed or wounded on the Chinese battlefield, and about 1.2 million were killed or wounded in the Pacific theater, which makes the statement that the Chinese battlefield became the main battlefield of the Japanese army somewhat untenable. Obviously, if the casualties on the Chinese battlefield are relatively small, then why keep such a large number of troops on the Chinese battlefield? As a result, the data given by the Japanese side has always been controversial in the field of history.
If we simply calculate the size of the Japanese troops eliminated on the battlefield in China, in the course of the 14-year War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, the number of Japanese troops wiped out by the Chinese military and civilians on the frontal battlefield alone was as many as about 400,000, and this does not count the number of Japanese troops eliminated behind enemy lines, but it is certain that this number will be far greater than the number of Japanese troops eliminated on the frontal battlefield. After the Soviet Union declared war on Japan, the Kwantung Army was annihilated by the Soviet Red Army in the northeast, and its force size was as high as more than 1 million people, which made the total number of Japanese troops wiped out as high as about 2.3 million, so this has also become a number that is generally recognized in the world.
One of the more controversial points is that in the Soviet Red Army's liberation of Northeast China, although most of the Japanese troops were annihilated by the Soviet Red Army, the Northeast Anti-Japanese Federation and local anti-Japanese armed forces were involved. It was with the cooperation of the anti-Japanese soldiers and civilians in Northeast China that the Soviet Red Army was able to defeat the Japanese army with lightning speed, forcing the Kwantung Army, which had occupied Northeast China for 14 years, to surrender after its collapse. However, because during this period, the Japanese Kwantung Army surrendered to the Soviet side, so although the combat location was in the Chinese battlefield, it is still controversial whether the Japanese troops that were wiped out in the Chinese battlefield can be counted, so there is no standard answer to how many troops the Japanese army lost on the Chinese battlefield.
However, it is certain that the Chinese battlefield, as the battlefield that has delayed the Japanese army for the longest time, is bound to make the Japanese army encounter unimaginable obstacles in the pace of aggression, and it is precisely with such an obstacle that Japan has no ability to reach out to more places, so that its dream of aggression has to be shattered.