Chapter 312
Although Moscow attached great importance to the plan to attack Hokkaido, in fact, this battle was not a large-scale battle from the beginning of its planning. According to the plan of the General Staff, the only ground forces that the Soviet army was actually prepared to dispatch in this battle were two army groups from the First Far Eastern Front.
The two armies were the 9th Red Banner Army commanded by Lieutenant General Savushkin and the 25th Army commanded by Major General Maksimov.
The reason for using these two armies is mainly because Hokkaido is not very large, and the terrain is complex, with many mountains and jungles, which is not suitable for large-scale combat. Even if there are more troops, it will be useless if they cannot be deployed. At the same time, the 25th Army has been tested in the battle against Finland before, and has long been accustomed to fighting in such complex terrain. As for the 9th Red Flag Army, they have received long-term mountain combat training in the Far East, and they are the most suitable for fighting in the Hokkaido area.
In the plan drawn up by Vasilevsky, the two armies would land in Wakkanai and Tsunayuki respectively, and the entire battle plan was divided into two phases. The first phase of the battle lasted for 15 days, and the goal of the battle was to defeat the Japanese defense forces in Wakkanai and Tsunayuki, establish a beachhead, and establish a stable bridgehead, and then advance towards Nayoro and Lake Kussharo respectively to consolidate the security of the bridgehead.
After the objectives of the first phase of the campaign are achieved, the first thing to consider is to build three to five forward airports in the bridgehead area to completely seize air supremacy in the Hokkaido area and provide solid control support for the next phase of the offensive.
In the second phase of the offensive, the 25th Army will take Sapporo as the main attack direction, and the 9th Red Flag Army will take Furano as the main attack direction, striving to end the entire Hokkaido operation within one month.
Judging from the entire operational plan, the General Staff clearly placed the focus of the Hokkaido Campaign on the Air Force. In order to support this operation, the campaign was assigned to two air armies and one independent long-range aviation division while only two ground armies were assigned to it. Among them, the 6th Air Army alone was assigned to five air divisions, seven mixed air regiments and three independent air brigades.
As a result, the number of various types of fighter jets that the Soviet army planned to deploy in the Hokkaido operation exceeded 3,000. If only the number of combat aircraft was considered, the Soviet army would definitely have an overwhelming advantage.
Yuri thought that Vasilevsky and the staff of the General Staff should have learned from the performance of the US military in the Philippine Campaign, seen the losses they suffered in the Philippine Islands and the combat methods they adopted, so they formulated such a combat plan. To put it bluntly, they intended to use the advantages in armed equipment to kill the enemy's vitality to the maximum extent, so as to achieve the ultimate goal of winning the battle.
This was also fully demonstrated in the list of material requirements subsequently drawn up by the General Staff. The demand for fuel and ammunition alone for such a battle in Hokkaido was already equivalent to that of the entire Belarusian campaign.
The whole meeting lasted until about 3:00 a.m., and after the meeting, Yuri did not go home, but went directly to the General Armament Department to convene a second round of department meetings to assign the corresponding material mobilization and transportation tasks. Yuri is now slowly adapting to his position, and he will no longer be responsible for many tasks, but will directly assign people to be responsible for them. As for him, he is responsible for the overall work, which is of course a correct idea.
However, he still paid close attention to the work of the Executive Bureau, because for him, that was the easiest place to achieve political achievements and the place most likely to attract the attention of Comrade Stalin. If he did not keep a close eye on it, he would feel uneasy.
To be honest, for today's Soviet people, of course, referring to those living west of the Ural Mountains, they really lack knowledge about the Far East. Most people don't pay attention to places that far away. They even only know that the Soviet Union's territory in the Far East is still vast, but they know very little about the specific situation there.
As for those young people who were born after the First World War, they don’t even know much about Japan. After all, the speed of information dissemination today is not that fast and people’s horizons are limited.
It is also because of this that most people would not pay too much attention to things like attacking Japan. In many people's minds, the country's foreign wars are over after defeating Germany and conquering Berlin. They even feel that fighting against Japan is not much different from robbery.
When the plan to attack Hokkaido entered the preparation stage, the Moscow media, including newspapers and radio, also stepped up coverage of the Pacific battlefield, which naturally included coverage of the Chinese battlefield. The main propaganda tone was that Japanese imperialism was exactly the same as German fascism, a group of inhumane, extremely evil anti-human thugs. The aggressive war they launched brought endless suffering to the Asian people, including China. Therefore, destroying Japanese imperialism is not only the responsibility of the Asian people, but also the responsibility of the Soviet people.
In addition, the media also began to publicize the Russo-Japanese War in the early 20th century and the border conflict in the Nomonhan area before the outbreak of the Great Patriotic War. The purpose of such propaganda is very clear, which is to mobilize the anti-Japanese sentiment of the Chinese people, pave the way for the campaign to attack the Japanese mainland, and clarify the justice of this campaign.
However, such propaganda did not seem to have much effect. It was not because people had become numb, but because everyone's focus recently was on the All-Soviet Games. With such a large-scale event in front of them, who would pay attention to the Japanese?
Yuri himself actually didn't care much about the All-Union Games. He just showed up on the opening day of the Games. After all, there was a large-scale parade held on that day on Moscow's Red Square. A number of senior Soviet leaders, including Comrade Stalin, were present to watch the parade.
Of course, it was not only the Soviet high-level officials who participated in the opening ceremony and parade, but also a large number of dignitaries from Western allies. For example, as the US representative, Eisenhower was present in person. What’s more interesting is that China came with two groups of representatives, each representing its own position.
Yuri watched the parade from the viewing platform of Lenin's Mausoleum, and then went to meet the players of the teams he was in charge of. This All-Soviet Games was not divided into teams by states or republics, but by fifteen republics, sports associations of various industries, plus the army, navy, air force, border guards, and internal forces. The scale was large and the lineup was luxurious. There were seven teams participating in the field that Yuri was in charge of alone.
Although Yuri doesn't care much about this sports event, he still shows his attitude. This is a question of political stance, and it is politically correct to express it.
However, on the second day of the official competition, the British ambassador to the Soviet Union, Sir Stafford Cripps, proposed Britain's plan to continue holding the Olympic Games in a meeting with Molotov.
According to the venue of the Olympic Games determined in 1939, the United Kingdom should indeed host the Olympics this year. However, due to the war, the Tokyo Olympics in 1940 was not held, and this year's Olympics should still be vacant. Cripps proposed that the so-called preparations for this year's Olympics would be held normally, and he also exchanged views with Molotov, which showed that the British were trying to promote peace talks between the two sides of the Greek Civil War.
Just over half a month ago, the so-called British expeditionary force was in great shape in Greece. The National People's Liberation Army commanded by the Greek Communist Party suffered a series of defeats and was directly driven out of Athens. But soon afterwards, although those Greeks did not receive assistance from the Soviet Union, they received military assistance from the newly independent Yugoslavia.
The Greek National People's Liberation Army immediately launched a counterattack and gained the upper hand in several exchanges of fire, putting the British in a very passive position.
Out of desperation, the British put forward conditions for mediation, advocating peace talks with the KKE in order to restore peace in Greece.
Molotov did not give a clear response to Cripps's hint, but based on what Yuri learned, Moscow did put some pressure on the KKE.
At this time, Moscow still had a strong desire to live in peace with Western countries, not only in Greece, but also in Asia, including China, Vietnam, and even North Korea. Stalin made great concessions to the Americans in decision-making. Among them, especially on the issue of North Korea, Stalin's signs of concession were the most obvious, because even now, the Americans did not have the ability to come to retake South Korea, but the Soviet army left the area east of the 38th parallel to the so-called provisional government supported by the Americans.
Yuri has reason to believe that within the current Soviet Red Army, there are actually people who are dissatisfied with Comrade Stalin's policy of compromise and concession, but no one will ever show this dissatisfaction.
Just like the All-Soviet Games, Yuri didn't care much about foreign policy issues because that job was far away from him and he didn't need to get himself into trouble for a job that was not part of his job.
During the All-Union Games, Yuri made detailed and careful arrangements for most of the major tasks he was responsible for, ensuring that each task was assigned to a specific person so that he could be held accountable in the future if the task was not carried out effectively. The reason for this rush was that he was going to get married after the Games, and he would have a period of vacation after the wedding.
