Before World War I, China missed its best opportunity for construction. After World War I, China fell into decades of warlord warfare and no longer had the financial resources and energy to build modern industries. After the Nationalist Government nominally unified China, the same Those who have been torn by large and small civil strife do not have the strength to engage in construction, and the country is weak. If you want to buy something, others may not be willing to sell it.
China is the largest overseas user of the Czech ZB 26 light machine gun, but they do not sell you the drawings, nor do they transfer production technology to you. Regardless of the machine guns they export, the number purchased by the Chinese accounts for a quarter of the total. One, but they won’t sell you the drawings and technology. In the end, you can only get the drawings by secretly surveying and mapping when you send someone to supervise the production.
However, things learned by stealing are still slow to mature. For a long time, the quality of the products produced has been uneven, and a considerable number of products are even of poor quality. This is true for machine guns, and more complex artillery, especially If it is an advanced model, it will be even more blocked from you.
If you want to buy the technology of some new weapons, you will either have to ask for a lot of money, or they will not transfer the technology to you no matter how much you pay. What they want to sell is the product, not the technology. In addition, some parties have always believed that self-made is not as good as outsourcing, and they do not want to If you go shopping for technology and cannot buy new artillery production technology, especially the original drawings, you can only continue to imitate old products that have backward performance and should be eliminated long ago.
A 75mm mountain gun designed by Germany before World War I, both the range and power have been greatly reduced, but it was still in production until the outbreak of the Anti-Japanese War. Among the Japanese army, it had already changed from division-affiliated artillery to regiment-affiliated artillery. The Type-1 mountain artillery was still the main mountain artillery produced by China before the Anti-Japanese War. Even these two artillery pieces, which had already fallen behind, were still the main artillery in some miscellaneous troops.
After years of weakness, most of the troops, even those with artillery, use old-style artillery. Even except for the Northeastern Army before the September 18th Incident, it has the largest number of artillery and the strongest self-production capabilities, and can produce its own mountain and field artillery. The performance of the counterfeit Japanese artillery of the Jinsui Army cannot be compared with the original Japanese artillery.
The weak domestic metallurgical industry cannot provide the steel needed to manufacture modern artillery. Most military production materials can only be imported from abroad at high prices. Once the import channels are cut off, or the import channels themselves are limited, then the limited Artillery production either has to be discontinued, or it can only produce products with poor performance.
What's more, these artillery pieces are already small in number. Some calibers only have a few shells in total. Like all the troops of the national army, the artillery also belongs to various factions, except for popular goods such as Japanese mountain field artillery and French-made field artillery. In addition, the other factions buy whatever artillery they can buy. If they can't afford new ones, they buy second-hand or even third-hand ones. As long as they can suppress their opponents in the civil war, they will also accept garbage.
The mountain field guns produced by France and Italy during the First World War, after intensive use in the First World War, the rifling was almost worn away. The biggest sales were in China during the warlords' melee, which even included the trophies they captured on the battlefield. After simple repairs, they were all sold to China.
In some places, there are miscellaneous armed forces, such as the 69mm mountain guns made in Italy or the Austro-Hungarian Empire purchased by the original Beiyang Army system, the 77mm field guns made in Austria-Hungary, and the Soviet-made field guns used by the Northwest Army system. The small warlords purchased the artillery, and even they themselves did not know which country produced the artillery.
There are dozens of these artillery pieces, but only one or two as few as possible, and some even have only one artillery piece of certain calibers, and there is not a single artillery shell that can be used by them in the whole country, because they have been used frequently during the long-term war, and they have no self-made artillery shells. In terms of production capacity, there are only a few rounds of artillery shells left. Once these artillery pieces are fired, they will be basically scrapped.
Some artillery pieces are even too old and have been used for too long. Once the cannon is ejected, the entire artillery piece falls apart. Moreover, the caliber of the artillery piece is too complicated, and the limited production capacity of artillery shells cannot meet the needs of artillery shells of different calibers. Apart from these junk, the number of remaining artillery pieces is even rarer.
Even if there are artillery shells, and they can produce some of the artillery shells themselves, no matter in terms of range or power, they cannot be compared with the Japanese artillery that has its own research and development capabilities, relatively sufficient finances, and can be constantly updated and replenished, especially the serious lack of artillery. Modern large-caliber artillery, especially howitzers.
The forty-eight German-made 150mm howitzers, dozens of German-made 105mm howitzers, and 96 imported by the Central Army totaled less than 200 of China's most advanced artillery, facing an army of millions , can only be used dispersedly, and if you lose one door, you will lose one.
The Japanese army lost a mountain artillery regiment, and the country could replenish one in the shortest possible time. The Chinese army lost an artillery company, and it would be quite difficult to replenish it. The Nationalist Government's severely backward military industry was unable to provide these artillery pieces. Plenty of shells.
You must know that the imitated Japanese Type 41 Mountain Cannon and the Bofors 75mm Mountain Cannon are both 75mm in caliber, but if you use the Type 41 Mountain Cannon shells for the Bofors Mountain Cannon, it will not only cause The artillery has almost no effect other than killing yourself by blowing up the barrel.
The 150 howitzer shells imported from Germany cannot be used by the Northeast Arsenal currently used by the Chinese army to imitate the Japanese Taisho 4 150 howitzer. Similarly, the French 75mm field gun shells imported by China cannot be imitated by the Chinese army. Used by the 75mm Japanese 38 field gun.
Seventy-five millimeters and seventy-five millimeters are not exactly the same. The approximate caliber is the same, which does not mean that the shells of the two artillery are indistinguishable and can be used interchangeably. Just like the two calibers of the Hanyang-made and the Chinese-made artillery are seven. Nine, they are even rifles designed by the Germans.
However, the ammunition of these two rifles is absolutely not interchangeable. If you take a bullet from a formal rifle and stuff it into a Hanyang-made rifle, it will explode. This is true even for rifles of the same caliber designed by one country, let alone those used by artillery. Although the artillery shells are all 75 mm in diameter, there are still differences due to the different countries in which they are designed and manufactured.
Even so, there are millions of people in the army and hundreds of divisions. Except for a few elites of the Central Army, most of the divisions have divisional artillery except for a few mortars. Even military artillery, even many miscellaneous armies, even a centralized miscellaneous army, only has a few artillery pieces.
For example, the Second Army, which is stationed in Taierzhuang, has only a few field artillery batteries. Together with the attached artillery, they are not as many as a Japanese division. And a miscellaneous army like the Sichuan Army does not even have a group army. As for artillery, the 22nd Sichuan Army that participated in the Battle of Xuzhou had only a dozen mortars in its two armies, four divisions, and eight brigades.
Except for the war zone dominated by the Central Army, which is better, the artillery in the rest of the war zones is almost pitiful. The battle is still based on mortars. Facing the Japanese army's tank advantage, most of the army lacks anti-tank artillery. There are not even many 20mm cannons that can be used as anti-tank guns if necessary.
The situation of the Central Army is still barely manageable. At least the leader of the National Army is more generous to the troops he has cultivated. Although the number of artillery units under the team is not large, the direct artillery force is still somewhat powerful, and there are counterattacks in the Central Army. Although there are not many tank guns and high-level dual-purpose guns, they are much better than those of other brands.
Those war zones mainly composed of miscellaneous troops are even worse. The total number of artillery in a war zone is less than that of a Japanese division. Even if there are a few old-fashioned artillery pieces, they are provided like treasures, and there is a severe shortage of artillery shells. Once it's all gone, there's no place to replenish it.
At present, the overall situation of the battlefield inside the pass is limited. Artillery can only be used intensively and strengthened in key theaters during wartime. In addition, many generals have no experience in infantry and artillery coordination. Most of the army has not received infantry and artillery coordination training. The limited artillery can only be used. The effect is also more limited.
Although after the outbreak of the Anti-Japanese War, a batch of artillery was imported from other countries at no expense, plus artillery purchased from the Soviet Union, it could not make up for the losses on the battlefield, let alone form a firepower advantage over the Japanese army, and without air firepower superiority and According to the needs of the war, the scale of the army's expansion is getting larger and larger.
As well as the national army's defeat on the battlefield, especially the habit of discarding all weapons and equipment when retreating, this batch of artillery was consumed quickly, and its effect was far from being as great as imagined. After four years of war, it could only Relying on outsourced supplements, even the Central Army, which has always been considered wealthy, currently has a very limited number of artillery.
With such limited artillery, coupled with the small number of aircraft of the Air Force, from the July 7th Incident to the outbreak of the National War of Resistance, in almost any battle, except for mortars, the Chinese army has never had Occupying the advantage in firepower, the Japanese army had never encountered suppression of firepower on the battlefield, let alone what it called a rain of artillery shells.
The limited artillery, after experiencing initial waste and battle damage, became a treasure in the later period. After being pulled out to fire a few shots when needed, it was immediately retracted for fear of being killed by Japanese bombers and heavy artillery. , Under this situation, the limited firepower could not bring any serious threat to the Japanese army. The Japanese army was running rampant on the Chinese battlefield. As long as they were careful not to fall into an ambush, there was no need to do so. Worried about the artillery of the Chinese army.
Before last year, the firepower of the Japanese army suppressed the Chinese army. On the battlefield, the Japanese army did not even know what anti-artillery was. This experience made Japanese officers at all levels develop an arrogant habit. A brigade often appeared without With increased firepower, relying only on the two 92 infantry cannons and two or three 37 infantry rapid-fire cannons in the artillery squad of one's own brigade, combined with heavy machine guns and grenades, one can dare to attack an army or even a group army. The Chinese army is on the rampage.
The excessive disparity in firepower made it difficult for an army to encircle a brigade of the Japanese army, let alone a division. There were even times when hundreds of thousands of troops were unable to encircle and annihilate a brigade-level detachment of the Japanese army. Even so, the 18th Army, which was even worse equipped, was even more helpless. The very little experience of being hit by firepower on the Chinese battlefield made these Japanese troops more arrogant and self-righteous.
When they really encountered a true ground-to-air superiority firepower attack, most of them had experienced what a sea of fire was for the first time. Many Japanese commanders who had no experience in fighting under such circumstances were confused at that time. It is understandable that these Japanese officers who experienced this kind of situation had some excessive reactions.
And Kiyoshi Ichiki is in this situation right now. He fired the first shot at Marco Polo Bridge and completely ignited the war between China and Japan. He has been rampaging on the Chinese battlefield for several years. Today is the first time that he is in this situation. I have experienced it before, and this is the first time I have seen it.