CHINESE FIGHTERS

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 127, 1 June 1938, Page 10

CHINESE FIGHTERS

METHODS IN COMBAT

FEARED BY JAPANESE

Mr. W. H. Donald, the Australian 1 who is adviser to General Chiang Kaishek, in a letter to his brother, Mr. H. Donald, of Carey Street, Marrickville, describes vividly the harassing of the Japanese armies by the Chinese in guerrilla warfare, says the "Sydney Morning Herald."

"The Japanese," he says, "dare not go more than 100 yards from either side of the roads. At night time the country belongs to the Chinese, and the Japanese remain sheltered.

"For some time the Chinese believed that the Japanese were supermen and were invincible. They learned, however, that a pike could poke a hole in a Japanese rascal as easily as it could let the life ouj of a Chinese robIber.

"Then came a remarkable change in the countrymen," Mr. Donald wrote. "They armed, and went after the Japanese wherever they got a chance.

"The Japanese were seen to be ter-ror-stricken by the Chinese coming with their big swords, and all the fight was soon out of them. A bayonet they tried to parry, but when they saw the mighty swords glinting in the sunlight they saw no way to parry them witH a rifle. The Chinese swing [the swords apparently at the head; if the Japanese raises his rifle to parry the blow, the sword is swept down

to the legs." CHARGED MECHANISED UNITS. Mr. Donald described the destruction by the Chinese of two crack divisions of Japan's Manchurian army. When these divisions got into action, he said, they found to their amazement that

they could make no impression on the Chinese, and that the latter were after them, charging, flanking,, and outflanking them. "The ill-armed Chinese demonstrated that they could withstand the mechanised units once they charged," he added.

Mr. Donald refers to the miscalculation of the Japanese generals who j stated at the outset of the war that: it would be all over in three months, and writes: "The history is that the Chinese stood the greatest concentration of bombing and blasting for three full months that any army has ever been asked to stand; that, after catching their breath, they went after the Japanese again, and have smashed the Japanese both in Shantung and Shansi Provinces. "The Japanese did not know the Chinese. They, as well as foreigners, failed to realise the new spirit that

had been developing in China during the past few years; they either failed < to see or ignored the effects of internal unity, the consequence of Japan's aggression, and they stuck to their old beliefs that the Chinese were cowards and would not fight, while the Japanese were unconquerable and irresistible." i The progress of the Japanese was 'checked at the Yellow River, he said, land they found themselves in a serilous position. i COLUMNS CUT OFF. "They found their long lines of communication being harassed by guerrilla units, and in time it dawned upon them that their columns were cut off and were being cut up by* the Chinese at leisure. There; were 100,QQQ„ troops In Shansi held up in that way, and what is left of them are still held up, being given no rest, and unable to do anything with the guerrillas. The Japanese cannot control any more than the immediate road, or the towns and cities where they are. .... "The result," Mr. Donald claims, is that the Japanese now admit that they have suffered the greatest disgrace in their military history. They are now bent upon a campaign of extermination. They are going to throw into the field the balance of their power, and thus convert what they still call an [incident* into the most costly war they have yet been engaged in. "They will visit up6n China terrible punishment for their defeat, because they have the aircraft and the artillery to do ii and whether the Chinese can stem this tide remains to be seen. "China will not give up, no matter what the Japanese try to do to her in the immediate future. If the Japanese come in sufficient weight to make . the Chinese withdraw, they will withdraw and continue withdrawing, fight- . ing while ever they can get the means i to do so. Their morale is high and | their determination great."