Craig Watson
speaker
4,699 appearances
13 recordings
1 series
first heard May 2026
last heard 17 Aug
Craig Watson’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 13 in all, peaking in Jun 2026 with 5.
Appearances
At 5 in the afternoon on June 11, a unit of the Japanese 13th Division under Tanaka Seiichi had broken in from the southeast.
Chinese troops of the 18th Army under Peng Shan and Liu Guangwen's 18th Division fought a savage close-quarters battle inside the city for a full day and night, while Japanese forces of the 3rd and 39th Divisions pressed from the north.
At four in the afternoon on June the 12th, with Deng Ping's battalion covering the withdrawal, the Chinese finally pulled out of Yichang, and it was lost.
Men in the high command do not always remember defeat the same way as men who had actually fought through it.
Soldiers tend to remember heat, hunger, the dead, or the exact corner where a friend fell.
Commanders also remember those things, but they remember something else as well.
Failure recorded in the language of responsibility.
Jiancheng could not forget that 20 Chinese corps had been beaten by just three Japanese divisions.
At the time, Li Zhongren had commanded the operation.
Now the chance to erase that old disgrace seemed to be passing into Jianqiang's own hands.
On September 20th, he received two telegrams, one from the Military Commission and one from Chiang Kai-shek himself.
From that point onwards, Li Zhongren dominated his thoughts.
By September 23rd, the Military Commission approved Jianqiang's request to transfer the 33rd Army Group of the 5th War Zone into the 6th War Zone for the coming attack.
On paper, his position seemed quite powerful.
He now had 14 divisions at his disposal.
Yicheng itself was held only by Uchiyama Eitaro's 13th Division and the Hayabayuchi Detachment, together amounting to roughly 16,000 men.
Even granting the usual Japanese superiority in training, firepower, communications, and local tactical cohesion, the Chinese possessed absolute numerical advantage.
By September 28, the Chinese units had reached their attack positions, and Chen Cheng set his operational designs into motion.
The forces on the right bank were to attack first and pull the main body of the Japanese 39th Division southward.
The 33rd Army would strike towards Jingmen and then Danyang in order to cut off the enemy's routes of retreat and reinforcement.
Showing 721–740 of 4,699 · page 37 of 235
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