Осада Цинтао в период Первой мировой войны

Operation during World War I

The siege of Tsingtao (link=no; link=no; ) was the attack on the German port of Qingdao (Tsingtao) during World War I by Japan and the United Kingdom. The siege was waged against Imperial Germany between 27 August and 7 November 1914. The siege was the first encounter between Japanese and German forces, the first Anglo Japanese operation of the war, and the only major land battle in the Asian and Pacific theatre during World War I.

Throughout the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Germany joined other European powers in a scramble for colonial possessions. As with the other world powers (including the United States and Japan), Germany began to interfere in Chinese local affairs. After two German missionaries were killed in the Juye Incident in 1897, China was forced to agree to the Jiaozhou Bay Leased Territory in Shandong to Germany in 1898 on a 99 year lease. Germany then began to assert its influence across the rest of the province and built the city and port of Qingdao, which became the base of the German East Asia Squadron of the Kaiserliche Marine (Imperial Navy), which operated in support of the German colonies in the Pacific. Britain viewed the German presence in China with suspicion and leased Weihaiwei, also in Shandong, as a naval port and coaling station. Russia leased its own station at Port Arthur (now Lüshunkou) and France at Kouang Tchéou Wan. Britain also began to forge close ties with Japan, and diplomatic relations became closer, with the Anglo Japanese Alliance being signed on 30 January 1902. Japan saw the alliance as a necessary deterrent to its main rival, Russia. Japan demonstrated its potential by its victory in the 1904–1905 Russo Japanese War, and the alliance continued into World War I. When the war in Europe began in August 1914, Britain promptly requested Japanese assistance. On 15 August, Japan issued an ultimatum, stating that Germany must withdraw her warships from Chinese and Japanese waters and transfer control of its port of Qingdao to Japan. The next day, Major General Mitsuomi Kamio, General Officer Commanding (GOC), 18th Infantry Division, was ordered to prepare to take Qingdao by force. The ultimatum expired on 23 August, and Japan declared war on Germany. At the beginning of hostilities in Europe, the ships of the East Asia Squadron under Vice Admiral Maximilian von Spee were dispersed at various Pacific colonies on routine missions. Spee's ships rendezvoused in the Northern Mariana Islands for coaling. then headed for the Indian Ocean, while the rest of the squadron made their way to the west coast of South America. The squadron engaged and destroyed two cruisers of a Royal Navy squadron at the Battle of Coronel, before itself being destroyed at the Battle of the Falkland Islands in the South Atlantic.

The Boxer Rebellion, at the beginning of the century, had led Germany to consider the defence of Qingdao. The port and the town were divided from the rest of the peninsula by steep hills. The main line of defence lay along three hills, Mount Moltke, Mount Bismarck, and Mount Iltis, from the Kaiserstuhl to Litsuner Heights. Guarding the left wing was Fort Moltke, on the hill of the same name, with two 9.4 in. (240 mm) guns. The heaviest firepower was concentrated in the four 11 in. (280 mm) howitzers of Fort Bismarck. On the right wing, Fort Iltis contained two 9.4 in. guns at the hill's summit. A second line of defence was set up along a closer line of steep hills. The final line of defence was along hills above the town. A network of trenches, batteries, and other fortifications had been built in preparation for the coming siege. Germany had strengthened the defences from the sea by laying mines in the approaches to the harbour and building four batteries and five redoubts. The fortifications were well equipped (though some with obsolete Chinese artillery) and were well manned.

On 27 August the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) sent ships under Vice Admiral Sadakichi Kato, flying his flag in the pre dreadnought battleship Japanese battleship Suwo, to blockade the coast of Jiaozhou. The British Royal Navy (RN) strengthened the Japanese fleet by sending the China Station's pre dreadnought and the destroyer The French Navy contributed with the cruiser Dupleix, who left the area when Japan assumed responsibility of the blockade on September 9th. On October 14, the Triumph was slightly damaged by a German shore battery, killing one member of its crew and injuring two others. The blockading fleet consisted mainly of nearly obsolete warships, though it did at times include a few modern vessels. These included the dreadnoughts Japanese battleship Kawachi, Japanese battleship Settsu, the battlecruiser Japanese battleship Kongō, her sister Hiei, and the seaplane carrier Japanese seaplane carrier Wakamiya, whose airplanes became the first of its kind in the world to attack sea and land targets. These Japanese airplanes would also take part in another military first, a night time bombing raid. The 18th Infantry Division was the primary Japanese Army formation that took part in the initial landings, numbering some 23,000 soldiers with support from 142 artillery pieces. They began to land on 2 September at Lungkow, which was experiencing heavy floods at the time, and later at Lau Schan Bay on 18 September, about east of Qingdao. China protested against the Japanese violation of her neutrality but did not interfere in the operations. The British Government and the other European great powers were concerned about Japanese intentions in the region and decided to send a small symbolic British contingent from Tientsin in an effort to allay their fears. The 1,500 man contingent was commanded by Brigadier General Nathaniel Walter Barnardiston and consisted of 1,000 soldiers of the 2nd Battalion, The South Wales Borderers; later followed by 500 soldiers of the 36th Sikhs. Following a friendly fire incident, British troops were given Japanese raincoats to wear so they would be more easily identifiable to the Japanese. The grandfather of film director Peter Jackson, William John Jackson (1889 1940) was present at the siege. The Germans responded to the threat against Qingdao by concentrating all of their available East Asian troops in the city. Kaiser Wilhelm II made the defence of Qingdao a top priority, saying that " it would shame me more to surrender Tsingtao to the Japanese than Berlin to the Russians". The German garrison, commanded by naval Captain and Governor Alfred Meyer Waldeck, consisted of the marines of III Seebataillon, naval personnel, Chinese colonial troops, and Austro Hungarian sailors, for a total strength of 3,625 men. He also had a modest complement of vessels, including the torpedo boat ; the decommissioned unprotected cruiser ; the auxiliary cruiser , which was the former captured Russian steamer Ryazan manned with the crew of cruiser Cormoran; four small gunboats: the , , , and ; and the Austro Hungarian protected cruiser , whose crew was initially divided in two: half to man the ship, and half to fight with the German land forces. On 22 August of the China squadron, under the command of Lieutenant Commander F. A. Russell, while routinely monitoring the naval trade routes, encountered and was damaged in action by the German torpedo boat S90, the German gunboat SMS Lauting and a 4 inch shore battery off Qingdao. She was hit twice from the retreating S90.

As the Japanese approached their positions, Meyer Waldeck withdrew his forces from the two outer defensive lines and concentrated his troops on the innermost line of defence along the hills closest to the town. The Austro Hungarian cruiser SMS Kaiserin Elisabeth was stationed in Qingdao at the start of the war. On 2 September 1914 the German gunboat Jaguar sank the stranded Japanese destroyer Shirotae. On 5 September a Japanese reconnaissance airplane scouted the port and reported that the Asian German fleet had departed, the Japanese ordered the dreadnought, pre dreadnought, and cruiser to leave the blockade. The next day the second air sea battle in history took place (the first air sea battle in history was at the Balkan wars in 1913) when a Farman seaplane launched by the Wakamiya unsuccessfully attacked the Kaiserin Elisabeth and the Jaguar in Qiaozhou Bay with bombs. Early in the siege, the Kaiserin Elisabeth and German gunboat Jaguar made an unsuccessful sortie against Japanese vessels blockading Qingdao. Later, the cruiser's 15cm and 4.7cm guns were removed from the ship and mounted onshore, creating the Batterie Elisabeth. The ship's crew took part in the defence of Qingdao. On 13 September the Japanese land forces launched a cavalry raid on the German rear guard at Jimo, which the Germans gave up and retreated. Subsequently, the Japanese took control of Jiaozhou and the Shandong railway. Lt. Gen. Kamio considered this the point of no return for his land forces and as the weather became extremely harsh he took no risk and fortified the troops at the town, returned the reinforcements that were on the way, re embarked and landed at Lau Schan Bay. On 26 September, Kamio resumed his advance, and the Germans were forced to retreat beyond the river Litsun. The Japanese made good time, crossing the river Paisha early in the day, swiftly crossing the seven mile lowland plain and reaching the northern bank of the Litsun. On 27 September, Kamio tried to take Prince Heinrich Hill by a frontal assault and was caught in a murderous crossfire. From the summit, the Germans rained down bullets from four Maxim guns. Out in the harbour, Kaiserin Elisabeth and Leopard shelled the exposed slopes, nearly routing the Japanese right flank. The Japanese assault was saved by the allied fleet. So deep was their anger that some German officers spat in the faces of their British counterparts. The 4,700 German prisoners were treated well and with respect in Japan, such as in Bandō prisoner of war camp. The German troops were interned in Japan until the formal signature of the Versailles peace treaty in 1919, but due to technical questions, the troops were not repatriated before 1920. 170 prisoners chose to remain in Japan after the end of the war.