"Eight Hundred" is a war-themed film directed by Guan Hu with the Anti-Japanese War as the background. It was scheduled to be released on July 5, 2019, but it was withdrawn a month before it was released. It will be re-released on August 21, a few days later.
The movie has not been released yet, but it is already controversial on the Internet. The controversy is not the movie itself, nor the lonely eight hundred patriotic soldiers, but a Weibo.
In January of this year, director Guan Hu, in order to promote "Eight Hundred", specially recruited Qin Han, the son of Sun Yuanliang, the former commander of the 88 division of the national army of , and Guan Hu posted a group photo of the two on Weibo to promote the film. The film Yaobai’s official Weibo was then forwarded and accompanied by a text: “As a descendant of those who witnessed the war, the pride and empathy of the old man is beyond words. I look forward to this feat reappearing on the screen.”
This is such a Weibo. , Attracted the crusade from netizens, and the reason behind this is to go back to the 1937 four-line warehouse defense battle, looking for answers from history.
In 1937, Japan launched a full-scale war of aggression against China. The Chinese and Japanese troops launched the first large-scale battle in the War of Resistance against Japan-the Battle of Songhu. The main battlefield was in Shanghai.
At that time, Shanghai was China's economic center, trade center, and the largest city in the Far East, close to Nanjing, the capital of the Republic of China. In order to seize control of Shanghai, the government of Chiang Kai-shek and invested more than 800,000 troops, and the Japanese side invested more than 300,000 troops. From August 13 to November 12, it lasted more than three months, and finally it was the defeat of the Chiang Kai-shek government. end. The story of the eight hundred soldiers
took place at the end of the Battle of Songhu in the four-row warehouse defense battle.
The four-line warehouse defending the Warring States Army was the 1st Battalion, 524th Regiment, 262nd Brigade, 88th Division. The deputy commander Xie Jinyuan served as the commander. It included three infantry companies and a machine gun company with a total of 420 people. It is claimed that there are 800 people, and the name of the movie "Eight Hundred" comes from this. The battle took place at the Sihang Warehouse on the north bank of the Suzhou River in Shanghai, so it was called the Sihang Warehouse Defense War.
Four-line warehouse is located on the north bank of Suzhou River in Zhabei area. It is a vault jointly constructed by Jincheng Bank, China South Bank, Mainland Bank and Salt Bank. It is also the tallest and most robust building in Zhabei. During the Battle of Songhu, the 88th Division requisitioned the Sixing Warehouse as the division headquarters, where a large amount of weapons, ammunition and living supplies were stored. The four-row warehouse is called the warehouse, which is actually a huge battle fortress.
Xie Jinyuan chose the four-line warehouse as a defensive position. In addition to the four-line warehouse itself, which is easy to defend and difficult to attack, there is also one of the most important reasons, that is, the south of the four-line warehouse is the public concession in Shanghai. The Japanese army dared not attack with heavy weapons by throwing rodents, and more importantly, the defense of the four-row warehouse itself was a performance battle for foreigners in the concession.
For the Chiang Kai-shek government, the Four Lines Warehouse is not a strategic location. From a military standpoint, it does not matter whether the Four Lines Warehouse can be held or not, and no one cares how many Japanese troops can be eliminated by the Four Lines alone, so this battle It is a performance, a show using the lives of "eight hundred" soldiers as the script, just to let the "foreign friends" in the concession see that the Chinese army is still fighting and the "determination" of the Chiang Kai-shek government to resist the war. To win pitiful sympathy.
We brought the time back to 1921. Japan seized German interests in China after World War I. In order to curb Japan’s ambition to monopolize China, the United States took the lead in convening the Washington Conference and passed the "Nine Nations Pact", which confirmed the powers in China. The principle of "open door, equal opportunity".
returned to the Songhu battlefield in 1937, when Japan had not yet declared war on the United States, Britain and other countries, and the signatories of the Nine-nation Pact planned to hold a meeting on November 6. The Chiang Kai-shek government hopes that through this meeting, the United States, Britain and other countries will intervene in the war and force Japan to return to the negotiating table. After all, Chiang Kai-shek did not officially declare war on Japan until the outbreak of the Pacific War in 1941. The "eight hundred" lone army of the Four Lines Warehouse is an important bargaining chip in order to win the sympathy of the great powers in this meeting. Since it is an important bargaining chip, Chiang Kai-shek is still willing to pay for it.
On October 26, the defeat of the Songhu Conference was evident, and Chiang Kai-shek decided to withdraw from the Songhu battlefield.The vast majority of the troops defended the capital Nanjing, and ordered the war zone chief Gu Zhutong to keep his 88th division in Shanghai, hoping to win the sympathy and support of the international community with the sacrifice of the 88th division.
The 88th Division of the National Revolutionary Army,
88, is one of the three most elite German weapon divisions in the national army. Chiang Kai-shek can break his arm and give up the 88th division, but the 88th division commander Sun Yuanliang's opinion can be big.
Sun Yuanliang has a nickname called "The Parachutist", but this "parachutist" is not the parachutist in "But let the dragon city fly generals and don't teach Huma to save the Yin Mountain", but refers to Sun Yuanliang's excellent escape skills. Just like flying with wings, it is an escape master "parachutist".
From left: 88 division chief of staff Zhang Boxing, division commander Sun Yuanliang, deputy commander Feng Shengfa
Sun Yuanliang graduated from the first phase of the Whampoa Military Academy and is a direct line of Chiang Kai-shek.
During the Northern Expedition in 1926, Sun Yuanliang showed his escape talent for the first time. At that time, Sun Yuanliang was appointed as the commander of the 1st regiment of the 1st Division of the 1st Army (look at this number, you can see that it is a direct line or a miscellaneous brand), and was ordered to garrison the outskirts of Nanchang. Unexpectedly, he was attacked by the direct Sun Chuanfang. As soon as the fight started, Sun Yuanliang threw the lead and fled, leading to the opening of Nanchang's portal, and the first division stationed in Nanchang City was defeated and abandoned. Later, Sun Yuanliang was stationed in Fengxin, but Sun Yuanliang was afraid of Sun Chuanfang and refused to execute the military order and continued to flee west.
Chiang Kai-shek learned that Sun Yuanliang was on the verge of fleeing, causing Nanchang to gain and lose, and ordered the military to engage in military law and shot Sun Yuanliang. Everyone thought that Sun Yuanliang was dead, but Chiang Kai-shek's "martial arts" was just a beautiful thing for everyone to hear. Sun Yuanliang was a student of Chiang Kai-shek. The direct line of the direct line had long been secretly sent to Japan to study and gilded.
In 1928, Sun Yuanliang returned to China after studying, and with the support of Chiang, he was promoted all the way to the rank of commander of the 88th Division in 1935. He became the first batch of troops to be reorganized and became one of the three most elite German weapon divisions.
On October 26, 1937, after Sun Yuanliang received the order to stay in Shanghai, 10,000 heads of grass nima rushed past in his heart, but how could our parachutist gain a reputation? Sun ran and immediately found Gu Zhutong, crying miserably, saying that the 88th Division is the elite of the national army and cannot be given up. Moreover, staying in Shanghai is out of political considerations. It is too wasteful to keep a division.
In the end, Gu Zhutong agreed that the 88th Division would retain one regiment's strength, but they must stick to it for 7 days to create favorable international public opinion for the Nine-Nation Convention.
After Sun Yuanliang returned to the division, he thought about it carefully and felt that there were too many troops in one regiment, so he decided to leave only the 420 people in the 1st battalion of the 524 regiment, and sent the deputy head Xie Jinyuan to command the battalion Four lines of warehouses stay behind to fight.
Xie Jinyuan and his subordinates
After the Nanjing defense battle started, the 88th Division of Sun Yuanliang was responsible for guarding Yuhuatai and Zhonghua Gate. Although the officers and soldiers of the 88th Division fought bloody battles, they were still lost. The outer positions were successively lost, and the Zhonghua Gate was also at risk. At this critical juncture, Sun Yuanliang fled again, attempting to cross the river north and retreat. Unexpectedly, Song Xilian, the commander of the 36th Division, who served as the supervising team, used a machine gun to "dissuade" him. Sun Yuanliang had to bite the bullet and return to the Zhonghua Gate to continue fighting.
can wait until Sun Yuanliang returns to the Zhonghuamen position. Because of the previous escape, the position at this time has been breached by the Japanese army. Nanjing's defense has failed. Sun Yuanliang left behind the 88th division officers and soldiers who were still desperately resisting and escaped alone.
In the “Rabe’s Diary”, Sun Yuanliang got involved in the refugee camp after the defeat. With Rabe’s help, he hid in the secret room of Jinling Women’s College and escaped the Nanjing Massacre, and was abandoned by the 88th division by Sun. The officers and soldiers became the souls of the Japanese invaders.
During the Nanjing Battle, only 500 officers and soldiers of 88 teachers and students returned.
The officers and soldiers of the 1st Battalion of the 524th regiment, who were also abandoned by Sun Yuanliang, had the same tragic fate as the 88th Division.
Because the four-line warehouse is easy to defend, difficult to attack and backed by the public concession, the four-line lone army killed 5 people and wounded 32 people at a relatively small price in 4 days and 4 nights, killing and wounding more than 200 Japanese soldiers, although it is not like The movie is so tragic, but it also shows the power of Chinese soldiers.
In the process of defending the Sixing Warehouse, countless Chinese and foreign people in the concession witnessed the Chinese army’s determination to resist Japanese aggression. There were even many Chinese and foreign reporters crossing the Suzhou River from the concession to Sixing Warehouse to interview Xie Jinyuan and others., To report their deeds of fighting alone, which has received great response and attention from all parties at home and abroad.
On October 31st, the United Kingdom requested Chiang Kai-shek to order a truce to maintain the security of the concession and for "humanitarian reasons." Lao Jiang also hoped that he would win the support of the British at the Nine Nations Convention, and did not dare to offend the British, and this battle has achieved the goal of attracting the attention of the Western world, so he ordered the Four Elements to withdraw into the British concession, and then with First retreated to the meeting of the 88th Division in the western suburbs of Shanghai.
The British concession authorities warmly welcomed Xie Jinyuan and his troops. British Brigadier General Alexander said to Xie Jinyuan: "I have never seen a scene more heroic than this (a more exciting performance)." Then Xie Jinyuan and others were asked to hand over. All weapons are not allowed to pass otherwise.
Xie Jinyuan certainly could not agree to such an unreasonable request to disarm, so he reported to the National Government through the Shanghai Garrison Commander that the Kuomintang authorities actually sent important officials to the concession and asked Xie Jinyuan to hand over weapons to cooperate with the British army.
Chiang Kai-shek was afraid of the British, and the British were afraid of the Japanese. Xie Jinyuan and other patriotic officers and soldiers were betrayed by their own people. Later, they were placed under house arrest by the British concession authorities in a lone army camp in Jiaozhou Park, Huxi, where they were de facto prisoners for four years.
In the lone barracks, the four-line lone army not only lost their freedom, but also cut off the most basic living supplies. Even raising the national flag in the barracks was not allowed.
In August 1938, Xie Jinyuan and others asked to raise the national flag on the first anniversary of the Battle of Shanghai, but the concession authorities opposed and suppressed it by force, killing and wounding more than 100 soldiers in the solitary barracks.
In April 1941, the Wang Puppet regime persuaded Xie Jinyuan to fail and lured four soldiers from the solitary barracks to assassinate Xie Jinyuan. This caused strong protests from all walks of life in Shanghai. The concession authorities were pressured by the Japanese to let the murderer go unpunished.
In December 1941, the Pacific War broke out. Japan declared war on the United States and Britain and occupied the Shanghai Concession. The soldiers in the solitary barracks became Japanese prisoners of war and were sent to the Pacific battlefield as coolies. By the victory of the Anti-Japanese War in 1946, the "eight hundred" solitary army was tortured by the Japanese army with only a hundred people left.
Seeing this, you must be aware of the controversy of the movie "Eight Hundred".
No one has ever denied the contribution of Xie Jinyuan and other patriotic soldiers to the war of resistance and salvation of the country, nor has anyone denied the historical existence of thousands of soldiers who died for the country. They are respectable and immortal, but they The greater it is, the more it brings out the cowardice and incompetence of Chiang Kai-shek and the Kuomintang high-level leaders, and the more disgusting it is for the "Eight Hundred" officials and some people with ulterior motives to wash the ground for the Kuomintang with the blood of martyrs.
and Guanhu's Weibo is even more fascinating. It feels like a movie about Yue Fei's loyalty to serve the country, but the director went to meet Qin Hui's descendants and gave them high praise. They all knew that they would meet in Taiwan. Can’t Sun Yuanliang’s descendants go to Shanghai to meet Xie Jinyuan’s descendants? It is really the general withered bones that no one asks, and the family knows all about the actors.
Xie Jinyuan's fourth son Xie Jimin at the Sixing Warehouse Memorial Hall
If Sun Yuanliang raped female college students, embezzled military expenses, or made a fortune, the fleeing generals would be touted as patriotic generals. This would be an insult to Xie Jinyuan and other martyrs. This is also the biggest controversy in the movie "Eight Hundred" due to the operation of the director's fan: don't tell the story well, and run to wash the ground for the national sinners and the KMT.
and if you only talk about the movie itself, "Yaobai" is a success, even the best done in a war movie so far, with first-class production, online actors acting skills, and role modeling is also quite successful, but in the central concept, "Eight Hundred" is neither reconciled to only tell the war, nor can it tell the story behind the war well. It is a nationalist sensationalist. It is unwilling to talk about the absurdity and irony behind the battle. Maybe it will fall into the "Wolf Warrior" style. It is difficult to achieve higher achievements because of self-movement.
