Battle of Changsha (1939) | |||||||
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Part of the Second Sino-Japanese War | |||||||
Japanese soldiers during the battle of Changsha | |||||||
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Belligerents | |||||||
Republic of China | Empire of Japan | ||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||
Xue Yue Chen Cheng Guan Linzheng Yang Sen[2] |
Yasuji Okamura Masatoshi Saito Ryotaro Nakai Shinichi Fujita Shiro Inaba Shizuichi Tanaka Shigetaro Amakasu | ||||||
Units involved | |||||||
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Strength | |||||||
~240,000 troops in 5 Army Groups, 1 Army, and 7 Corps divided between 30 Divisions in total.[3] |
~120,000 troops in the 11th Army split between 6 Divisions 12 naval ships 100+ aircraft 100+ motor boats[4] | ||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||
Chinese claim : 40,193 killed, wounded, or missing[5] | 50,000 killed, wounded and missing[6] |
The First Battle of Changsha (17 September 1939 – 6 October 1939; Chinese: 第一次長沙會戰) was the first of four attempts by Japan to take the city of Changsha, Hunan, during the second Sino-Japanese War. Coming two weeks after Germany's invasion of Poland on September 1, it was the first major battle of the war to fall within the time frame of what is widely considered World War II.