by Xinhua author Ma Yunfei
BEIJING, Sept. 19 (Xinhua) — When the Germans invaded Poland in 1939, guerrillas in northeast China had already fought eight winters in frigid blizzards, as Asia’s anti-fascist battle started with China’s resistance following Japanese provocations 94 years in the past on Sept. 18, 1931.
The Communist Party of China (CPC) and the Northeast Anti-Japanese United Army (NAJUA) below CPC management waged a battle towards Japanese aggression in northeast China for 14 years. In his report on a short historical past of the battle, Mu Qing, China’s distinguished journalist and the late former president of Xinhua News Agency, known as it “unprecedented in Chinese history in terms of brutality and hardship.”
“It was a history written with blood and sacrifice, yet it also stands as a testament to the glory and pride of the Chinese nation in the face of a brutal enemy invasion,” Mu wrote.
This summer time, I launched into a reporting and analysis journey to the three provinces of northeast China alongside a number of colleagues from totally different departments of Xinhua. As a local of northeast China, I used to be delighted to return to my hometown, Changchun in Jilin Province, even when we solely stayed there briefly for one evening.
During the week-long journey, we visited quite a few memorial websites, together with the Northeast China Revolutionary Martyr’s Memorial Hall, constructed on the previous web site of the Harbin Police Department of puppet state of “Manchukuo” throughout World War II, and the Exhibition Hall of Evidences of Crime Committed by Unit 731 of the Japanese Imperial Army, which silently testifies to and serves as a stark indictment of the anti-human atrocities of battle.
We additionally visited former guerrilla base areas and battlefields the place the NAJUA had fought. Most importantly, all through the journey, we realized about their heroic tales. We had been crammed with profound reverence and a renewed appreciation for the priceless peace we get pleasure from right now.
THE FROZEN FRONT
It appeared that no different military on the planet shared the destiny of the NAJUA, whose principal founders and leaders principally died in battle. Nor has every other military endured such relentless threats — hunger, freezing and fight — for over a decade, from its commander-in-chief all the way down to strange troopers.
Yet it was this very drive, below CPC’s management, that fought for 14 years, annihilating greater than 170,000 Japanese troops and over 50,000 puppet troopers, whereas pinning down as many as some 760,000 well-equipped Japanese troops, making an indelible contribution to the World Anti-Fascist War.
After the victory within the War of Resistance in 1945, Peng Zhen, late Chinese proletarian revolutionary and one of many leaders of the CPC, as soon as put the NAJUA’s 14-year battle as one of many three most arduous chapters all through the over 20 years of historical past of the CPC-led revolution, standing alongside the Long March of the Red Army and the three-year guerrilla warfare waged by the Red Army in southern China.
The hardships endured throughout NAJUA’s resistance surpassed something I may have imagined. In winter, the area turned a frozen world of ice and snow, with howling winds so bitter that water would freeze immediately. Lighting a hearth was extraordinarily harmful, as even a skinny wisp of smoke rising above the treetops may entice enemy troops.
In such circumstances, to not point out grain, even wild grass was buried below thick snow. The NAJUA troopers had been compelled to subsist on tree bark, cotton wadding, and even their very own boiled wula footwear, a type of shoe made out of cattle disguise and full of carex meyeriana, worn within the winter in northeast China. Even after they may take shelter in underground hideouts, frostbite and even amputations had been commonplace among the many guerrilla fighters.
Even in summer time, the mountain forests had been crammed with lethal threats, from swarms of mosquitoes and flies to venomous snakes and sudden, unexplained outbreaks of illness. Meanwhile, Japanese and collaborationist forces severed all ties between the resistance fighters and native villagers, making the availability of meals and drugs extraordinarily tough.
In the traditional forests of Hongshilazi in Panshi City of Jilin Province, CPC’s first anti-Japanese base in northeast China and a nationally protected web site linked to the NAJUA, the circumstances had been exceedingly harsh. Meng Qingxu from the Jilin provincial institute of cultural relics and archaeology, who led the Hongshilazi Site excavation workforce, pointed to a big stone with a comparatively easy floor and advised us that it served as an working desk the place gunshot wounds and bone fractures had been handled for the troopers.
UNCONQUERABLE SOULS
The Hongshilazi anti-Japanese base was constructed by CPC member Ma Shangde, who had united disparate native anti-Japanese militias right into a cohesive resistance drive with a transparent, highly effective rallying cry: “Chinese don’t fight Chinese; save the bullets for the enemies.” As one of many founders and key leaders of NAJUA, Ma would later be immortalized in historical past below his heroic title, General Yang Jingyu.
Yang Jingyu is a family title in China, and his heroic deeds are included in class textbooks in China. During the War of Resistance, below extraordinarily harsh circumstances, Yang led anti-Japanese armed forces, braving the extreme chilly of minus 40 levels Celsius, combating bloody battles towards enemies a number of instances their quantity. Wartime archive documented that within the over 100 days main as much as his martyrdom at 35, Yang engaged in roughly 47 battles towards enemy forces.
When Yang sacrificed himself, not a single grain of meals was present in his abdomen, however solely withered grass, tree bark and cotton wool. A couple of years later, Ryuichiro Kishitani, the Japanese commander who had witnessed the loss of life of General Yang Jingyu, dedicated suicide. “With iron-blooded soldiers like Yang Jingyu, China will certainly not perish,” he wrote in his will.
Another legendary hero of the resistance and revered NAJUA commander who struck worry into the hearts of the Japanese forces was General Zhao Shangzhi, who fought towards the invaders in Heilongjiang Province within the north. Operating below extraordinarily arduous and threatening circumstances, Zhao led his forces in over 100 battles towards the Japanese and puppet troops, repelling quite a few large-scale “encirclement and suppression” campaigns.
The Battle of Bingtangzi was a profitable ambush orchestrated by Zhao. In this engagement, the NAJUA suffered minimal casualties whereas annihilating over 300 Japanese troopers and seizing giant portions of weapons and ammunition. “A small ‘Manchukuo,’ but a giant of a man, Zhao Shangzhi” was the pissed off lament of the Japanese invaders. Zhao was 34 years previous on the time of his sacrifice.
The heroism of the NAJUA heroines was no much less monumental. As one of the vital lionized feminine revolutionary martyrs, Zhao Yiman was a pivotal determine in northeast China’s anti-Japanese resistance. Captured in 1935, she endured brutal torture however divulged nothing to the enemy. Executed on the age of 31 in 1936, she urged her younger son in her last phrases to take delight in her sacrifice for the nation.
“It’s my regret that I haven’t fulfilled a mother’s duty to raise and guide you. There will be no chance for us to meet again in this life. My most beloved child, I have no need for a thousand words to teach you. I teach you by how I have lived. When you are grown, I hope you will never forget that your mother gave her life for the country,” Zhao wrote in a letter.
In October 1938, eight feminine NAJUA troopers, led by 23-year-old Leng Yun, drew enemy hearth to guard the primary drive’s retreat, finally leaping into the icy Wusihun River in Linkou County of Heilongjiang when surrounded, sacrificing their lives, with the youngest barely 13. This has change into one of the vital tragic and heroic episodes of the battle.
THOSE WHO REMEMBER
Throughout the journey, I used to be deeply moved and profoundly impressed by the spirit of the NAJUA, a legacy constructed upon unwavering loyalty to the Party, the braveness to courageous nationwide calamity and the valor to combat till the very finish. It has additionally made me cherish all of the extra the peace we get pleasure from right now, which was gained via such sacrifice.
What moved me much more was witnessing so many individuals who nonetheless bear in mind these heroes and are devoted to sharing their heroic tales with generations to return.
At a memorial park in Heilongjiang’s Shangzhi City, previously often known as Zhuhe County, which was renamed after General Zhao Shangzhi to honor his sacrifices, I met 72-year-old Yang Yan, who’s a former director of the Shangzhi Martyrs Memorial and has continued to function a volunteer information since her retirement.
She led the best way and guided me to the very finish of a stone path — the location the place Zhao Yiman was wounded in battle and later captured 90 years in the past. “I wipe the dust from her statue every time I visit,” Yang stated, plucking a leaf from a close-by department and gently brushing the bottom of Zhao Yiman’s likeness. “She was the same age as my grandmother.”
In Jingyu County of Jilin Province, which is likewise named after the hero, docents like Li Yan on the General Yang Jingyu Memorial Hall on the web site of his martyrdom are protecting his story alive. Every time she recounts the overall’s last moments, her eyes effectively up with tears. “From the moment I started this job, I was deeply moved by General Yang Jingyu’s story. I want to use whatever strength I have to pass on this revolutionary spirit and heritage,” she stated.
The memorial attracts teams of younger guests yearly who come to pay their respects. Liu Xuanwei, a neighborhood younger CPC member, stated that since childhood, his grandparents taught him to study from General Yang’s instance and contribute his personal half to the Party, the nation and the folks.
In Harbin, a stark black dice now stands on the location the place the infamous Unit 731 of the Imperial Japanese Army performed ugly germ warfare assessments and human experimentation throughout World War II. The museum information and preserves the proof of those inhuman wartime atrocities.
A 76-meter tunnel leads into daylight on the exit of the exhibition corridor, its partitions inscribed with victims’ testimonies and confessions from former Unit 731 members. “Don’t look back. Walk forward. Ahead lies the light, the warmth of life, and a nation thriving in peace,” a information’s voice echoed via the tunnel. Step by step, guests adopted the trail ahead.
At the Northeast China Revolutionary Martyr’s Memorial Hall, among the many numerous heartfelt messages left by guests, one be aware on a slip of paper deeply moved me.
“History books are too small to hold your immense greatness. Every page I turn speaks of a whole life dedicated and sacrificed,” learn a message written by Li Xinuo, a fifth-grader from Harbin Jihong Primary School. In her earnest, childlike handwriting, she expressed a reality extra shifting than many grownup phrases.
Other guests had left messages too: “We never met, yet I live by your grace,” and “Please come see our happy lives in the New China you made possible.”
How I want they may see the peaceable new China they gave their lives to construct.