Ch 32 - The Russo-Japanese War

Expanding the Fight

Japan's Imperial Army won its first major land engagement against the Russians at the Battle of the Yalu River as the Imperial Navy established a tighter grip on the Russia fleet at Port Arthur.

Near the end of April 1904, General Kuroki's 1st Army was ready to cross the Yalu River into Manchuria near Sinuiju. General M.I. Zasulitch, who commanded some 26,000 men of the Russian Eastern Detachment, knew that a Japanese army was in front of him, but he neither retired nor concentrated his forces for the fight. With most of his cavalry committed on his flanks and the heaviest concentration of his troops either deployed in fixed positions between Antung and the Ai River or held in reserve, he had left himself with very little wiggle room.

On the night of April 25, soldiers from the Japanese Guards Division captured a pair of small islands in the Yalu River and forced the Russians to abandon their forward observation post. Once the islands had been secured, General Kuroki ordered a feint attack along the lower Yalu River the following morning, where Japanese gunboats fired on General Mitshenko's Transbaikal Cossack Brigade detachments near the mouth of river. The attack convinced General Zasulitch that the main strike would be against the Antung area, where the bulk of his force and his reserves were concentrated.

On April 26, Japanese engineers began building a trestle bridge across the Yalu in full view of the Russians, which immediately focused the attention of two Russian artillery batteries. While the Russians concentrated their fire on the bridge builders, the Japanese built five other trestle bridges across the numerous river channels to carry a rapid, large-scale advance across the 6,000 yard wide sandy flats of the Yalu River. Despite the daily shelling, the Russians did not destroy a single bridge.

With diversionary attacks on the Russian right flank underway, General Kuroki Tamemoto moved elements of the 12th Division into position to attack the weak Russian left flank, anchored on the Ai River. The Russians watched nervously as the 12th Division forded the Yalu near Suikuchin, about 8 miles northeast of Sinuiju, and quickly reported to General Zasulitch their position was about to be assaulted and was in danger of being outflanked. The report made little difference to Zasulitch, who remained convinced the main assault would come at Antung, and that's where he stayed. For him, retreat was not an option until he had taught the Japanese a lesson.

The Japanese launched their attack in the early morning hours of April 29, when the balance of the 12th Division crossed the Yalu northeast of Suikuchin and advanced in three columns against Russian positions along the Ai River. Zasulitch, still convinced that this was just a feint, redeployed only a single battalion and four additional guns. With the 12th Division advancing on the Russian left flank, the Guards Division moved into position with its artillery support in the center opposite the small town of Chiuliencheng. The 2nd Division took position on the 1st Army's left flank, ready to advance on the newly erected causeways leading from the town of Sinuiju.

Faced with a major assault, General Zasulitch had more than enough encouragement to withdraw to more defendable terrain, but he would not concede the obvious. He was looking to win. He even sent a message to the Tsar in St. Petersburg claiming that victory was all but his. Far from retreating, General Zasulitch ordered the Eastern Detachment to hold in place. The results were predictable.

The Japanese 1st Army completed its three division advance across the Yalu by midnight on April 29 under weather conditions that severely limited visibility. When the fog finally lifted around 5:00 a.m. on the morning of April 30, the Russians discovered the 1st Army spread out in front of their positions.

Russian artillery opened fire at about 10:00 a.m., as advance elements of the 2nd Division moved towards Chiuliencheng. The Japanese reacted almost immediately. Within minutes the entire Japanese front line exploded as over 90 field guns and howitzers opened up on the exposed Russians. Russian counter battery fire was ineffective and after an hour and a half, the Russian guns fell silent. The Russians opened fire again at around 1:20 p.m. from around Chiuliencheng, but were silenced after only thirty minutes. Japanese artillery continued firing into the area until dusk. Troops of the 2nd Division and Guards Division advanced in full force, without hesitation or finesse, and stormed forward under heavy fire.

The combined attack by the 2nd and Guard divisions against Chiuliencheng and the 12th Division's envelopment of the Russian left flank along the Ai River, forced General Zasulitch to finally order a withdrawal. It was too little, too late. Having largely neutralized the Russian artillery, General Kuroki pressed the attack. A brief, but ineffective counterattack by elements of the 12th East Siberian Rifle Regiment to protect the withdrawal only served to open new breaks in the Russian lines. The Japanese drove the Russians from their lines and decimated their ranks as they tried to reach a fall back position.

As the day progressed, the Russian position became wholly untenable. The Russian troops that remained on the line were slowly being encircled and cut off. The Russian line broke into small groups, each trying to withdraw on their own. Many of these small groups put up a good fight, but were nonetheless destroyed. The sudden appearance of the Japanese 12th Division moving west from the Ai River against very light resistance, quickly spread panic among the Russians and led to a complete rout of Zasulitch's left flank.

As the cold reality of the day set in, General Zasulitch and his command staff realized their rapidly dwindling resources were not going to stop the ferocious, determined Japanese army. General Kuroki's troops pushed the remnants of the Eastern Detachment off their lines and into a disorganized retreat towards Feng-hwang-cheng. General Kuroki Tamemoto's 1st Army forced the Russians into a retreat from which they never fully recovered. By 5:30 p.m. on May 1, the Russians found themselves hopelessly trapped in a narrow gorge and surrendered. For the immediate future, the road to Manchuria from Korea was open.

In early May, the Japanese War Office authorized a number of foreign correspondents to return to the Yalu River area where the 1st Army was pushing into Manchuria. The press corps, which included reporters and writers from the United States, France, England, Germany and Italy, gathered near Antung to report on the war. Jack London, a writer for the Hearst newspaper chain in the United States, sent the following story describing how the Japanese outwitted the Russians by building their trestle bridge across the Yalu under fire:

At the mouth of the Yalu the Japanese had two small gun-boats, two torpedo-boats and four small steamers armed with Hotchkiss guns. Also they had fifty sampans loaded with bridge materials. These were intended for a permanent bridge across the Yalu at Wiju [sic] ... The presence of the small navy and loaded sampans let the Russians to believe that there was where the bridge was to be built. So right there they stationed some 3,000 men to prevent the building of the bridge. Thus a handful of Japanese sailors kept 3,000 Russian soldiers occupied in doing nothing and reduced the effectiveness of the Russian strength that much.

Jack London described the Russians as "sluggish" in battle, while

The Japanese understand the utility of things. Reserves they consider should be used not only to strengthen the line...but in the moment of victory to clinch victory hard and fast...Verily, nothing short of a miracle can wreck a plan they have once started and put into execution.

The true significance of the Battle for the Yalu River was not that Japan had won, but that Russia had lost. It mattered little that the Russians had escaped or that they had been out-numbered nearly four-to-one. The cold hard fact was that they had been beaten. The brutal fighting cost the Russians nearly 2,700 casualties. Among the nearly 42,500 troops of the Japanese 1st Army, the fighting left 1,036 dead and wounded.

The first serious land campaign of the Russo-Japanese War destroyed not just the Russian Eastern Detachment, but the perception that the war would be short, that Russia would be victorious and that Japanese were an easy enemy. In the short span of five months the Russians suffered two serious defeats at Port Arthur and the Yalu River.

Throughout March and April, troops had been arriving at Namp'o from a number of embarkation points in Japan. General Oku Yasukata's 2nd Japanese Army, originally intended for the left flank of the Manchurian invasion, anxiously awaited news from the Battle at the Yalu River. The men and equipment of the 1st, 3rd and 4th Divisions, and one artillery brigade were packed aboard 103 troop transport ships anchored along the banks of the Tadeong River estuary over a distance of some 18 miles. The decks were so crowded that it was next to impossible for the men to get any exercise and many could not even get fresh air.

The mission of the 2nd Army was to land on the south coast of Manchuria between Takushan (modern Gushan) and Dairen, cut the communication lines between Port Arthur and the main Russian army and advance along the railway against Liaoyang. Wild excitement spread through the army on May 2 with news of General Kuroki's victory at the Yalu River. The next day, the first flotilla of sixteen transports steamed out of Namp'o for a landing near Pitzuwo (modern Pikou), approximately sixty miles northeast of Port Arthur.

Rough seas prevented a landing on May 4 and the flotilla took shelter near the Elliot Islands, a cluster of small islands located about eight miles from the mainland. After a careful coastal reconnaissance revealed the shoreline ill-suited for putting troops and equipment ashore near Pitzuwo, a second landing site was located some miles further west along the coast near the mouth of the Tasha River. At 5:20 a.m. on May 5, a landing party of six officers and some 1,000 men waded ashore through shallow waters and muddy beaches without opposition. The first large scale movement of Japanese troops destined for the seizure of Port Arthur had begun.

Despite Vice Admiral Togo's recent reports, Japanese Imperial Headquarters was unsure whether Port Arthur had been sufficiently blockaded to prevent large Russian ships from interfering with the troop landings and assumed that torpedo attacks against the transports was a certainty. They ordered elaborate precautions be taken by Togo's fleet to block the approach of Russian destroyers and torpedo boats. All available destroyers and torpedo boats, nearly 60 in all, were stationed either off Port Arthur or between Port Arthur and the Elliot Islands. Torpedo nets, floating booms, mines and constant patrols were used to protect the straits between the Elliot Islands and the landing beaches. Under the assumption that it was still possible for a determined attack to reach the transports, the ships were moved into shallow water so that if they were sunk, the superstructures would remain above water and give some chance that men and equipment could still be moved ashore.

Japanese activity around the Elliot Islands made it plain enough to Viceroy Admiral Evgenii Alekseev in Port Arthur where the Japanese landings were taking place. Alekseev briefly assumed direct command of the 1st Pacific Squadron following the death of Admiral Marakov aboard the Petropavlovsk in mid-April. Within hours after Admiral Togo's fleet made its unsuccessful attempt to blockade Port Arthur on the night of May 4, Alekseev received word from Russian reconnaissance patrols in the area that the Japanese were landing troops near Pitzuwo. It was clear that Port Arthur would soon be cut off from the outside world.

Viceroy Alekseev realized that he could not stay in Port Arthur, telling one associate that "As an Admiral I can do it, but as Supreme Commander I cannot." He immediately wired Tsar Nicholas II in St. Petersburg to ask for instructions. The tsar authorized his departure and ordered him to establish a new headquarters in Mukden. At 11 a.m. on May 5, Alekseev and his staff boarded a special train so hurriedly that it gave the impression that the viceroy was fleeing from the enemy.

Alekseev's train passed through the town of Pulantien (modern Pulandian) on the morning of May 6, just ahead of advancing reconnaissance patrols from the Japanese 3rd Division, who were under orders to cut the railroad and destroy the telegraph line at Pulantien. Later that day, the Japanese fired on a second train from Port Arthur loaded with refugees and the sick as it approached from the southwest. The train halted and raised the Geneva Convention Red Cross flag. As soon as the Japanese ceased firing, the train bolted forward and ran through Pulantien at full speed. Two days later, troops of the 3rd Division cut the rail line and telegraph wires at Lungkou, midway between Pitzuwo and Chinchou (modern Jin Xian). By May 8, the Japanese 1st and 3rd Divisions occupied a line along the Pitzuwo-Chinchou road from the Tasha to the Shouyi rivers.

Vice Admiral Skridlov, an officer with long and distinguished service, was given command of the 1st Pacific Squadron after Makaroff's death and ordered to the Far East. With land communication to Port Arthur cut off, Skridlov became stranded in Vladivostok soon after his arrival on May 22, 1904. Vice Admiral Petr Alexeievich Bezobrazov, who was sent out to take command of the 1st Pacific Squadron, could not travel to Port Arthur and became the third fleet commander in Vladivostok.

Before he left Port Arthur, Alekseev appointed his chief of staff, Rear Admiral Vilgelm Karlovitch Vitgeft, "temporary commander" of the squadron. He got the job largely because he was the most senior officer left in Port Arthur. Vitgeft was not a man of action and proved ill-suited to the task. His selection seems odd in that Alekseev could have picked one of several experienced admirals available. The admiral commanding the port's defenses was, by most accounts, an able and intelligent leader. Even the squadron's second-in-command, Admiral Prince Pavel Petrovich Uhktomskii, had at least commanded a naval squadron, something Vitgeft had never done. When Alekseev strongly recommended a fleet action against the Japanese transports, Vitgeft stated in no uncertain terms that he was not going to undertake actions beyond the harbor, but would concentrate instead on defending the fortress at Port Arthur.

Well-defended with mines, floating booms and artillery, the protected anchorage between the Elliot Islands and the Liaodong Peninsula became an advanced staging area for Vice Admiral Togo's fleet, replacing its former coaling-station on the Korea coast. Although the Japanese fleet's close proximity to Port Arthur left its transport ships vulnerable to attack, the Russians made no effort to interfere with the troop landings.

The 4th Division began landing operations on May 10, followed five days later by the 5th Division and the 1st Cavalry Brigade. General Oku's 2nd Army reached full strength on the Liaodong Peninsula by May 23. The move against Chinchou and the advance along the coast to Dairen was ready. Japan was determined to use the fine harbor of Dairen Bay as their ultimate operations base where troops and material could be put ashore in support of the planned siege of Port Arthur.

News of the Japanese landing on the Liaodong Peninsula with the evident intention of attacking Port Arthur generated great concern at Russian Military Headquarters in St. Petersburg. The loss of Port Arthur would be a serious blow to Russian plans. Orders were dispatched from Tsar Nicholas II that Rear Admiral Vilgelm Vitgeft and the garrison at Port Arthur were to hold out to the last. General Aleksei Kuropatkin, commanding the forces in Manchuria, was urged to use every means at hand to effect a relief of the harbor. The entire world watched the sharpening focus of Japanese attention on the Russian naval facility at Port Arthur with acute interest.