Steel Soviet Union

Just as Malashenko and his political commissar comrades were discussing Yamada Otozo's next step.

In the Kwantung Army headquarters just one district away, Yamada Otozo, who was being talked about by Malashenko, was also worried about his fate.

The Russian army, including tanks and infantry, was parked just a block away. Of course, Yamada Otozo could see it even if he was not blind, and he was more aware of his current situation.

But when it comes to how to deal with the current situation and what to do, Yamada Otsuzo is in trouble. Seeing that the time for the Russian ultimatum has expired, he cannot make a decision.

Time passed by minute by second, and Yamada Otozo continued to wait. The feeling of suffering and anxiety was no better than that of ants on a hot pot.

"Your Excellency, Commander! Call me back, I've got a call back!"

"Nani!? Did Tokyo call back?"

Yamada Otsuzo stood up from the chair instantly and was very excited, as if he had grasped some sudden life-saving straw. However, the next words of the chief of staff undoubtedly disappointed him.

"Hi! Your Excellency Commander, but the content of the message, the content"

The Chief of Staff, who knew what the Commander was expecting, stammered for a moment and couldn't speak clearly. He was speechless for a while.

With the bad premonition getting stronger, Yamada Otsuzo stopped writing, and immediately snatched the message from the chief of staff's hand, and started reading it himself without hearing the report.

It doesn't matter if you don't look at it. One look at it really made Yamada Otozo angrier and angrier. In the end, he was so angry that he slapped the table with a loud "bang".

"Baga! A common man in the military! Malu Yelang!! Totally incompetent!!!"

There was only one reason why Yamada Otsuzo was so angry that he was yelling: the people from the military department asked him about surrender or war, but they neither agreed nor denied it. They openly played a game of kicking the ball and took this hot potato again. Put him back.

Nominally, he was asking the military department what to do next, whether to fight the Russians to the end or surrender depending on the situation.

But in fact, Yamada Otsuzo made the situation very clear in the telegram, highlighting the fact that "the battle can no longer be fought at all." It was not that he did not want to fight but that he simply could not fight.

To this day, Yamada Otsuzo, who even had his headquarters taken away by the Red Army once, has completely lost the capital to continue this battle.

There are still many remnants of the Kwantung Army on various fronts, but in fact there are almost no troops that can still be commanded and can exert valuable military significance.

The reason is also very simple. The telegrams sent by the various units that can still be contacted are either asking for help or in emergency. As for mobilization, don't even think about it. They are either tightly entangled and overwhelmed by the Russian army, or they are being destroyed. in the process of.

Under such circumstances, even retreat is a delusion. Anyone who dares to leave the position will be overtaken and intercepted by Russian tanks, followed by a steady stream of Russian troops to cover them up, and finally in the form of a torrent of steel. Completely submerge the Japanese troops who dared to retreat.

Several organized division-level troops have told the other Kwantung Army at the cost of blood not to even think about escaping in front of the Russian tracks. Various rumors and horror stories from the front reached the remnants of the Kwantung Army, and most of them were in panic all day long.

Faced with such a rotten battle situation, Yamada Otozo had long discovered that there was actually no difference between giving orders and not giving them.

The troops cannot move or fight, and the ground connections between the troops have long been cut off piece by piece by the Russians. How can we fight this battle? What do you want the troops to do? What is meaningful to do?

There are almost no orders to give except "continue to hold on". Yamada Otsuzo, who initially said in the telegram that "reinforcements are on the way", can no longer even say this.

There is only less than one brigade of troops left in front of the Kwantung Army Headquarters. At this time, where are there any reinforcements to send?

The situation was clearly stated in the telegram, and then an inquiry was added as to whether the war would be fought or surrendered.

Yamada Otsuzo felt that as long as the people in the military headquarters were not pig heads, they would definitely understand what he wanted to express. It would be too hasty for him, the commander of the Kwantung Army, to make the decision to surrender. It would only be appropriate if there was at least an order from the military headquarters.

Who would have thought that those smart people in the military department who were really not wetted in their brains and could still understand the twists and turns involved would not accept his trick at all.

It was obvious at a glance that Yamada Otsuzo was trying to pass the blame. He did not want to bear the blame for the surrender, so he insisted on passing it on to the military in the hope of achieving "surrender as ordered."

The military department, which has its own interests, has always been at odds with the Kwantung Army Group. You don't like me, and I think you are a weakling. Naturally, it is absolutely impossible for Yamada Otsuzo, the leader of the Kwantung Army, to take the blame.

Moreover, this method is almost "impeccable". I neither say that you are allowed to surrender nor that I will not allow you to surrender. If I say it, it means I haven't said it. What I want is this effect.

You, Yamada Otozo, are responsible for what to do specifically.

The war has reached this point, and Yamada Otsuzo, who is still nominally under the orders and control of the military headquarters, really didn't expect it. The intrigue between the Kwantung Army and the Military Headquarters is still going on even at such a critical juncture, and they are still shirking responsibility and blaming each other.

But in his anger towards the military, Yamada Otozo failed to realize, or he directly subconsciously filtered out one thing and selectively forgot it.

The initiator of this blame-shifting drama was none other than himself.

"Your Majesty Commander, what should we do now? The Russians don't have much time for us."

""

As the saying goes, what kind of commander leads what kind of soldiers.

Yamada Otsuzo, who himself was a wavering surrender faction, was like this even as the military chief of the Kwantung Army Group. It can be expected what the chief of staff will be like to help him.

Anyone who really couldn't pee in a pot wouldn't be able to survive now. Yamada Otsuzo would have driven him back to his hometown to eat himself.

Like Yamada Otsuzo, the chief of staff, who knew that the war was no longer possible and that there was only a dead end except surrender, was more inclined to choose the former.

Now that I know that the military department's reply is so rude, my mentality is almost the same as Yamada Otozo's. I feel worse than swallowing a fly alive, but there is no better way.

The two leaders of the capitulation faction looked at me and I looked at you, but neither one of them could tell a trick.

The chief of staff, who really couldn't think of a way to do it, and felt that he was being pushed into something, suddenly felt a little superior, and suddenly a sentence popped out of his mouth that made Yamada Otozo shake his head just listening to it.

"Your Majesty Commander, if there is really no other way, why not kill those civilians and then fight to the death with the Russians! We will all perish together!"

Yamada Otozo, whose right eyelid couldn't help but twitch, slowly opened his eyes, glared at the chief of staff, and then spoke without thinking.

"You mean, just like what Ushijima Mitsuru did in Okinawa, right?"

Although the Battle of Okinawa had just ended, Yamada Otsuzo, as an absolutely powerful person within the Japanese army, still learned some relevant news at the first time.

It is said that in the last moments before the defeat of Ushijima Manna, he almost killed all the local civilians, and the number of people killed was hundreds of thousands. If you include the Japanese soldiers who were killed, the total number of dead has exceeded 200,000, at least half of which were directly caused by Ushijima Mitsuru's crazy orders.

Yamada Otozo didn't want to imitate this kind of behavior, and made a surrender plan in advance for later use, just to avoid committing suicide like a crazy and stupid guy like Ushijima Mitsuru.

Without waiting for the chief of staff to answer, Yamada Otozo, who was shaking his head more and more, spoke immediately.

"Let me ask you a question, do you know why the Russians haven't shelled the city until now? Why, except for those artillery shells to persuade them to surrender, have they never fired an explosive projectile?"

Upon hearing this question, the chief of staff, who felt that he understood it well, immediately answered without thinking.

"It's obvious, Commander, that the Russians care about the civilian casualties in the city. I think that since the Russians have exposed this, what do they care about and we have to do the opposite. Killing all these civilians will definitely make people The Russians are very embarrassed. Their previous efforts and bloodshed were all in vain!"

The logic makes sense, but it's a pity that Yamada Otozo, who is still shaking his head like a rattle, doesn't think so.

"Then let me ask you again, do you know how the Russians will react after doing this? Do you know how they will retaliate?"

"revenge?"

Subconsciously, the chief of staff was about to say, "How else can we take revenge? It's just to kill us all, or at worst, use artillery fire. Anyway, it's just a piece of jade and there's nothing to care about."

Unexpectedly, before he opened his mouth, Yamada Otsuzo, who asked and answered his own questions, had already given what he thought was the answer, which was really unexpected by the chief of staff.

"The Russians will retaliate in equal measure, or even double retaliation. Do you know how many Japanese expatriates are in the hands of the Russians now? It is everything on the land under our feet, everything! We only have less than one brigade of troops. The Russians They are just a block away from us, do you think the Russians will let us attack civilians?"

The chief of staff who was speechless when asked was still puzzled. Although he hesitated, he couldn't help but finally replied to Yamada Otozo.

"Your Excellency, Commander, can the Russians really do such a thing? Aren't they coming to attack us claiming to be liberators?"

"Liberator? Oh, do you really believe what the Russians say about themselves?"

""

The chief of staff, who really felt something was wrong and that was not the case, was speechless. Yamada Otsuzo, who had put away his disdainful tone, returned to his normal state and continued to speak.

"From 1941 to the present, millions of Germans have died at the hands of the Russians. The total number of servants who obeyed the Germans and been wiped out by the Russians is already more than our Kwantung Army. "

"What makes you have the illusion that the Russians, who have taken millions of lives at their own hands, will not take the lives of tens of thousands of people? Have you forgotten what happened outside Harbin? The Russians have repeatedly Our consuls and diplomats will kill whenever they say, do you really think they will have any scruples in retaliating? "

"Since we are no longer able to defeat, why should we involve those who have nothing to do with it? When those expatriates fell under the butcher's knife of the Russians in droves, you said these relatives, family members, and supporters of the Kwantung Army Do you know that we caused them to end up like this? What will they think about waiting for us in hell?"

After all, surrender sounds disgraceful, and you have to find some excuse to whitewash your appearance. For example, Yamada Otsuzo, who doesn't really care about those Japanese expatriates, is like this right now.

It sounds righteous and awe-inspiring, but what's the purpose? The purpose is nothing more than to make the chief of staff give up on this idea and continue to stand in the "capitulationist" camp with one heart and one mind. The so-called making excuses for the overseas Chinese is just an excuse.

The Chief of Staff, who is not stupid himself, must have heard something. He also knew that the Commander’s words were not so much meant for him to listen to, but rather to be said to himself first so that he could repeat it to the young men. The red deer listened to the fight to the end.

Let these idiots understand how surrender is helpless, how they have no choice, and how it cannot be accompanied by any unrealistic illusions. This is more important than anything else, and it is also a key step that can ultimately lead to surrender.

The knowing chief of staff reacted quickly and changed quickly. After a few moments of thinking, he quickly showed a knowing expression to Yamada Otsuzo, then nodded, bowed, and responded.

"Hey! Your Excellency, Commander, is teaching you! It was my subordinate who just didn't think carefully."

"Well, it doesn't matter, it's not important. The most important thing is to understand the truth. It's not too late to understand now."

Before he finished speaking, Yamada Otozo thought for a moment and thought about the plan of "You will be the first grader, I will be the fifteenth grader. If you are unkind, don't blame me for being unjust." It was time to make the final decision.

"No, tell the Russians. You should go there in person. It's not that far away anyway. Tell the Russians that we accept their terms and are willing to surrender on the premise that they can guarantee the safety of our lives."

The chief of staff was shocked when he heard this, but when he thought about it, it was not surprising that he had reached this point. The chief of staff replied immediately.

"Then, what should the troops below do? How should we inform them of this matter? The Russians will definitely ask us to order the entire Kwantung Army to surrender."

Yamada Otozo, who had already thought of a solution to this problem, replied without thinking too much.

"Telegram to all units of the Kwantung Army, saying that the military headquarters acquiesced to the surrender of the Kwantung Army and did not refuse. Our department was allowed to surrender with the approval of the military headquarters. Remember to send the message in clear code when the time comes. You will personally draft the specific content of the telegram. Draw it up."

""

The chief of staff, who felt more and more chills running down his spine as he listened, knew that as soon as this clear message was sent out, not only the Kwantung Army and the Russians on the battlefield outside the Pass would receive the message, many people would also keep their eyes on this battlefield and prick up their ears. can be heard by everyone.

"Your Majesty, Commander, what do you mean?"

The Chief of Staff could almost guess what Yamada Otozo wanted to do. To say that he was breaking up with the military and flipping the table was not an exaggeration. Before he finished speaking, Yamada Otozo spoke again with a cold smile on his lips.

"Those common men in the military don't care about our lives at all. They don't have the slightest semblance of being superiors. They only use vague telegrams like this to fool us and shirk responsibility!"

"If that's the case, then there's no need to worry about the military department anymore! Didn't they neither agree nor deny in their reply? Well, it's all up to us to understand. My understanding is that no denial means agreement. The war situation has been corrupted to this point. If you don’t deny surrender, what is that but consent?”

"If they dare to send such a telegram to shirk their responsibilities at such a critical moment, they will have to bear the price! Let these Malanogi go to His Majesty the Emperor to explain themselves when the time comes!"

Obviously, Yamada Otsuzo's clear code telegram was sent out, which was equivalent to directly putting the military headquarters on the fire.

Originally, the Kwantung Army Group and the military headquarters exchanged such strange telegrams all day long. Both sides were used to it, and both could understand the "code words" and would not take certain things seriously. It's just that this kind of thing cannot be discussed on the table, as long as both parties understand it in their hearts.

As a result, Yamada Otozo decided to play "Spring and Autumn Brushwork" this time, pretending to be confused while pretending to understand, and deliberately engaging in diode thinking using "either right or wrong".

I have made the situation so clear. If you don’t deny it, then I will only agree with it, and I will also “tell it to the world.” Let’s see how you guys, Malanoro, who didn’t even issue clear military orders and deliberately shirked their responsibilities, will explain this shameful thing to His Majesty the Emperor.

In this way, the chief of staff who understands the situation will certainly know what to do next.

Anyway, now he is tied to Yamada Otozo and has been abandoned by the military department for shirking responsibility.

It would be better to follow the commander's method. No matter what happens, you can find a way out for yourself and avoid becoming a scapegoat and cannon fodder for the military to shirk its responsibilities.

Once the decision is made at the Kwantung Army Headquarters, the next thing will be relatively easy to handle.

Soon, Malashenko was at the location of his temporary military headquarters, late at night.

When the last moment was approaching with less than two hours left before the ultimatum, the Kwantung Army Chief of Staff, Lieutenant General Tsunamasa Yotote, arrived late at night.

"We are ready for battle and are about to launch the final general attack. I wonder why you came here in the middle of the night? Are you here to surrender to us?"

Facing the Russian lieutenant general in front of him, he spoke sarcastically without even using a basic honorific. The Kwantung Army chief of staff, who didn't even have a chair to sit on, nor was he invited to sit down, felt even more humiliated.

However, he had orders and knew that this was the only way he could do it. He still endured the humiliation and stayed in place, standing and speaking to the Russian Lieutenant General sitting behind the negotiating table opposite.

"The Chief of Staff of the Kwantung Army, Lieutenant General Tsunamasa Yotote, was appointed by the Commander of the Kwantung Army, General Yamada Otsuzo, to lead a special negotiation team to discuss the armistice with your army."

"Pfft - armistice?"

He couldn't hold back his laughter for a moment, and not only Malashenko, who was sitting in the main seat, was laughing, but also the political commissar and Lavrinenko who accompanied him to the seat and carried the rank of major general on his shoulders. A group of staff officers, meeting recorders, and translators who were also present at the meeting also laughed out loud, and the scene was extremely happy for a while.

Being in a scene that was almost bursting with laughter, the Japanese soldiers, who had no chairs to sit on and could only stand, wanted to find a crack in the ground and crawl in.

"There is no truce, and we have no intention of truce at all. I know that a certain word is difficult for you to say, but what I want to say is that if I can't hear the word, then I can only order the guards to Kick all of you out immediately, and then—"

After speaking for a while, he raised his hand and glanced at his watch, and Malashenko continued to speak deliberately.

"Well, we will launch a general attack on you in one hour and seventeen minutes. We will definitely see you again in less than two hours, but at that time there is no guarantee whether everyone standing here is dead or alive. Of course, I don't care about convenience. Yes, even if you turn into minced meat and bring it to me to meet again, that’s not impossible.”

Malashenko's Russian voice gradually faded away, and the translator on the side immediately repeated it truthfully.

Knowing that he was forced to a dead end, the Kwantung Army Chief of Staff had only one way left. His last trace of dignity seemed to have been beaten to pieces by the Russians in public, so he had to lower his head and speak slowly.

"We are willing to surrender and accept the conditions proposed by your army. We are here to discuss surrender with you."

Malashenko, who could understand this without the need for an interpreter, sneered, glanced at the Kwantung Army chief of staff, and then spoke quietly.

"Look, you can still say this. It's not that difficult. Face is sometimes worth less than the Japanese soldiers you can recruit with just one stamp."

"If I had known this, why did I do it in the first place?"

I coded a big chapter and uploaded it all in one go. I’ve been waiting for a long time, brothers.