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Remembering Lushun battle
By Eric S. Margolis
Remember history lest we are fated to repeat it. Exactly 100 years ago, October 1904, Russia and Japan were locked in ferocious land and sea battles for control of the strategic harbour of Lushun on the Yellow Sea, then known by its Russian name, Port Arthur.
I was the first foreigner allowed into Lushun, a top-secret Chinese naval base whose missile-armed destroyers and submarines defend the maritime approaches to Beijing and industrial Manchuria.
My purpose: to commemorate the incredible valour and ferocity of the forgotten 1904-05 Russo-Japanese War, the 20th century's first great conflict.
In 1900, the imperial powers were raping helpless China. Russia and Japan both coveted Manchuria, a vast, resource-rich area in China's far north. Four years later, their ambitions collided at Russian-ruled Port Arthur, a magnificent, deepwater harbour sheltered from typhoons, and ice-free year round.
The Imperial Japanese Navy opened the war in February. 1904, by a surprise attack against Russia's Pacific Squadron at Port Arthur. Japan used the same tactic in its 1894 war with China, and would do so a third time against the US in 1941 at Pearl Harbour.
The Japanese fleet blockaded the Russian squadron in Port Arthur. A Japanese corps under venerable samurai general, Yasusuke Nogi, landed and quickly invested Port Arthur, which was defended by 47,000 Russian troops, Cossacks, and sailors.
Three other Japanese corps landed in Korea, crossed the Yalu river, and attacked the 150,000 Russian troops in Manchuria.
The siege of Port Arthur opened in September with heavy Japanese attacks on the strong northeastern forts guarding the road and rail line into the port. These modern concrete forts - Ehrlung shan, Chikuan shan, Sungsu shan - resisted all attacks, thanks to valiant resistance by Russia's Siberian troops and to new weapons that made their world debut at Port Arthur.
These included 18-20 feet deep belts of dense, interlaced barbed wire, covered by Maxim machine guns and quick-fire fields guns, which protected the Russian forts and trench lines connecting them; powerful searchlights and star shells; hand grenades that were widely used for the first time; even attempts to use poison gas.
All these new weapons played lethal roles 10 years later in World War I. Like the Great War's French and British generals, Japan's commanders at Port Arthur did not understand the murderous power of modern weapons against massed infantry and paid the price in frightful losses.
The Russian commander, General Stoessel, was an incompetent defeatist. Russia's ablest general, Kuropatkin, was killed by a Japanese shell. The most aggressive Russian admiral, Makaroff, sortied out to attack Adm. Togo's blockading Japanese fleet. His flagship, battleship "Petropavlosk," hit a mine and sank.
Unable to take the northeastern forts, General Nogi turned his attention to fortress' western side, dominated by the 203 meter hill. Nogi belatedly understood that this hill, which overlooked the harbour, held the key to victory.
The battle for the steep 203-metre hill - up to 40 degree inclination - was one of the most murderous dramas of the bloody siege. I had trouble just climbing it. Japanese human wave attacks charged up the hill, led by special volunteer units called "ketshitai." Their orders: "do not expect to return alive." Some of the Japanese samurai officers leading the attacks had actually fought decades earlier in full armour, with swords.
Russian Siberian riflemen fought with equal valour, mowing down the attackers with machine guns, and grenades. The hillside was three or four deep in bodies. Eleven-inch Japanese siege guns relentlessly pounded the 203mm hill and the northeastern forts.
Desperate to relieve Port Arthur, Tsar Nicolas II ordered the Russian Baltic Fleet under Admiral. Rozhestvensky, based in St Petersburg and Krondstadt, to steam three quarters of the way around the globe to succor the beleaguered fortress.
On December 5, 1904, the Japanse 7th Division finally took the 203 metre hill. Ten thousand Japanese and 5,000 Russian died there. Japanese artillery spotters on 203 quickly began raining heavy shells on the trapped Russian fleet in the harbour, four to six kms distant, sending battleships and cruisers to the bottom.
General Nogi renewed attempts to storm the three key northeastern forts. Round the clock Japanese assaults were repulsed by fierce hand-to-hand combat on the fort's ruined parapets and in their rubble-filled moats and shattered casemates. The defenders used bayonets, knives, rocks, and burning oil.
The Japanese then resorted to the mediaeval tactic of mining under the fort's walls and defensive galleries protecting the moats. The Russians counter-mined. An underground war ensured, fought with spades and pistols. Finally, the Japanese managed to detonate huge mines containing 2.5 tons of dynamite under the main forts, blowing their forward walls and defenders to bits.
Erhlung fort dissolved into rubble. Chikuan shan's heroic Russian defenders fought to the last man. These bitter siege operations eerily presaged the murderous battles for Verdun's forts in 1916, and Canadian mining operations in 1917 at Vimy against German fortified positions.
Port Arthur had become, said a Russian journalist, "a living hell." Only 5,000 Russians were still under arms; 15,000 lay sick or wounded. On January 3, 1905, the garrison surrendered. Four battleships, two cruisers, and fourteen gunboats fell to the Japanese, whose total casualties reached 90,000.
Rozhestvensky's Baltic Fleet arrived too late to save Port Arthur. The Russian admiral headed for Vladivostok by steaming due north through the narrow Tsushima Strait between Japan and Korea.
Admiral Togo on his flagship "Miyaka", was waiting. In one of history's greatest naval battles, Togo sprang from ambush, crossed the Russian T, and destroyed the entire Russian fleet. I was able to sail over much of the area of this great naval action.
Disaster was complete. In a geopolitical earthquake, a European power was defeated for the first time by "inferior" Asians. Triumphant Japan longed for more military glory. A month after Tsushima, uprisings erupted across Russia that lit the fuse of the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution.
When Japan's emperor Meiji died in 1917, loyal samurai retainer, General Nogi, committed ritual suicide, or "seppuku" to join his master.-
By Eric S. Margolis
Remember history lest we are fated to repeat it. Exactly 100 years ago, October 1904, Russia and Japan were locked in ferocious land and sea battles for control of the strategic harbour of Lushun on the Yellow Sea, then known by its Russian name, Port Arthur.
I was the first foreigner allowed into Lushun, a top-secret Chinese naval base whose missile-armed destroyers and submarines defend the maritime approaches to Beijing and industrial Manchuria.
My purpose: to commemorate the incredible valour and ferocity of the forgotten 1904-05 Russo-Japanese War, the 20th century's first great conflict.
In 1900, the imperial powers were raping helpless China. Russia and Japan both coveted Manchuria, a vast, resource-rich area in China's far north. Four years later, their ambitions collided at Russian-ruled Port Arthur, a magnificent, deepwater harbour sheltered from typhoons, and ice-free year round.
The Imperial Japanese Navy opened the war in February. 1904, by a surprise attack against Russia's Pacific Squadron at Port Arthur. Japan used the same tactic in its 1894 war with China, and would do so a third time against the US in 1941 at Pearl Harbour.
The Japanese fleet blockaded the Russian squadron in Port Arthur. A Japanese corps under venerable samurai general, Yasusuke Nogi, landed and quickly invested Port Arthur, which was defended by 47,000 Russian troops, Cossacks, and sailors.
Three other Japanese corps landed in Korea, crossed the Yalu river, and attacked the 150,000 Russian troops in Manchuria.
The siege of Port Arthur opened in September with heavy Japanese attacks on the strong northeastern forts guarding the road and rail line into the port. These modern concrete forts - Ehrlung shan, Chikuan shan, Sungsu shan - resisted all attacks, thanks to valiant resistance by Russia's Siberian troops and to new weapons that made their world debut at Port Arthur.
These included 18-20 feet deep belts of dense, interlaced barbed wire, covered by Maxim machine guns and quick-fire fields guns, which protected the Russian forts and trench lines connecting them; powerful searchlights and star shells; hand grenades that were widely used for the first time; even attempts to use poison gas.
All these new weapons played lethal roles 10 years later in World War I. Like the Great War's French and British generals, Japan's commanders at Port Arthur did not understand the murderous power of modern weapons against massed infantry and paid the price in frightful losses.
The Russian commander, General Stoessel, was an incompetent defeatist. Russia's ablest general, Kuropatkin, was killed by a Japanese shell. The most aggressive Russian admiral, Makaroff, sortied out to attack Adm. Togo's blockading Japanese fleet. His flagship, battleship "Petropavlosk," hit a mine and sank.
Unable to take the northeastern forts, General Nogi turned his attention to fortress' western side, dominated by the 203 meter hill. Nogi belatedly understood that this hill, which overlooked the harbour, held the key to victory.
The battle for the steep 203-metre hill - up to 40 degree inclination - was one of the most murderous dramas of the bloody siege. I had trouble just climbing it. Japanese human wave attacks charged up the hill, led by special volunteer units called "ketshitai." Their orders: "do not expect to return alive." Some of the Japanese samurai officers leading the attacks had actually fought decades earlier in full armour, with swords.
Russian Siberian riflemen fought with equal valour, mowing down the attackers with machine guns, and grenades. The hillside was three or four deep in bodies. Eleven-inch Japanese siege guns relentlessly pounded the 203mm hill and the northeastern forts.
Desperate to relieve Port Arthur, Tsar Nicolas II ordered the Russian Baltic Fleet under Admiral. Rozhestvensky, based in St Petersburg and Krondstadt, to steam three quarters of the way around the globe to succor the beleaguered fortress.
On December 5, 1904, the Japanse 7th Division finally took the 203 metre hill. Ten thousand Japanese and 5,000 Russian died there. Japanese artillery spotters on 203 quickly began raining heavy shells on the trapped Russian fleet in the harbour, four to six kms distant, sending battleships and cruisers to the bottom.
General Nogi renewed attempts to storm the three key northeastern forts. Round the clock Japanese assaults were repulsed by fierce hand-to-hand combat on the fort's ruined parapets and in their rubble-filled moats and shattered casemates. The defenders used bayonets, knives, rocks, and burning oil.
The Japanese then resorted to the mediaeval tactic of mining under the fort's walls and defensive galleries protecting the moats. The Russians counter-mined. An underground war ensured, fought with spades and pistols. Finally, the Japanese managed to detonate huge mines containing 2.5 tons of dynamite under the main forts, blowing their forward walls and defenders to bits.
Erhlung fort dissolved into rubble. Chikuan shan's heroic Russian defenders fought to the last man. These bitter siege operations eerily presaged the murderous battles for Verdun's forts in 1916, and Canadian mining operations in 1917 at Vimy against German fortified positions.
Port Arthur had become, said a Russian journalist, "a living hell." Only 5,000 Russians were still under arms; 15,000 lay sick or wounded. On January 3, 1905, the garrison surrendered. Four battleships, two cruisers, and fourteen gunboats fell to the Japanese, whose total casualties reached 90,000.
Rozhestvensky's Baltic Fleet arrived too late to save Port Arthur. The Russian admiral headed for Vladivostok by steaming due north through the narrow Tsushima Strait between Japan and Korea.
Admiral Togo on his flagship "Miyaka", was waiting. In one of history's greatest naval battles, Togo sprang from ambush, crossed the Russian T, and destroyed the entire Russian fleet. I was able to sail over much of the area of this great naval action.
Disaster was complete. In a geopolitical earthquake, a European power was defeated for the first time by "inferior" Asians. Triumphant Japan longed for more military glory. A month after Tsushima, uprisings erupted across Russia that lit the fuse of the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution.
When Japan's emperor Meiji died in 1917, loyal samurai retainer, General Nogi, committed ritual suicide, or "seppuku" to join his master.-
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