The largest and bloodiest battle of the Second Sino-Japanese War, its conclusion triggered a strategic stalemate that prolonged the conflict until 1945.
Key Facts
- Duration
- Four and a half months (1938)
- Chinese troops deployed
- Over 1,000,000 troops
- Chinese casualties
- Up to 1,000,000 military and civilian casualties
- Provinces involved
- Anhui, Henan, Jiangxi, Zhejiang, Hubei
- Outcome
- Japanese capture of Wuhan
By the Numbers
Location
Cause → Event → Consequence
Japan's campaign to seize China's industrial and political heartland drove its Central China Area Army, under General Shunroku Hata, to advance on Wuhan, the temporary seat of the Chinese Nationalist government. China mobilised over one million National Revolutionary Army troops under Chiang Kai-shek across the Fifth and Ninth War Zones to resist the offensive.
From June to late October 1938, Japanese and Chinese forces clashed across five provinces in the largest, longest, and bloodiest engagement of the entire Second Sino-Japanese War. Chinese defenders, supported by Soviet Volunteer Group pilots, contested the advance at tremendous cost before Japanese forces ultimately captured Wuhan on 27 October 1938.
China suffered up to one million casualties, while Japan endured its heaviest losses of the war. Faced with unsustainable attrition, Japan shifted focus northward rather than pursuing total conquest, ending the era of large pitched battles and initiating a strategic stalemate that persisted until Japan's entry into the broader Pacific conflict after Pearl Harbor.
Belligerents & Mobilization Analysis
Side A
2 belligerents
Chiang Kai-shek.
Side B
1 belligerent
Shunroku Hata.