Ganbaatar Batsaikhan

Ганбаатар Батсайхан

Flag of Mongolia (1940-1945)

Flag of Mongolia (1945-1992)

- Manchuria 1945

Ili Rebellion

- Xinjiang 1946-1948

**Ganbaatar Batsaikhan** (Mongolian: Ганбаатар Батсайхан; November 29, 1917 - June 15, 1999) was a Soviet-era Mongolian cavalry officer who served in Machuria during World War II and after.

## Early life and family

Batsaikhan was born in the sum of Delgerkhaan in Mongolia in 1918. His father, Negrüi Ganbaatar (1895-1971), once a Bogd Khan supporter but since 1919 a dedicated Communist, fought in the Russian Civil War (1917-1923) against Chinese and White Russian forces when they invaded Mongolia, whne Batsaikhan was very young. The family were semi-nomadic herders, and Batsaikhan grew up primarily learning animal husbandry and horseback riding.

At the age of 14, Batsaikhan decided to leave his family to travel to the capital city of Ulaanbaatar to find work in one of the newly-built factories. He worked in a textile factory for three years, until he was encouraged to join the Mongolian People's Army due to the threat of Japanese expansionism on the eastern border.

## MIlitary service

### World War II

Joining the army in 1934, Batsaikhan was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 49th Cavalry Regiment, 8th Cavalry Division. Though only seventeen years old, he quickly impressed his Mongolian superiors and their Soviet advisors, so that he was considered for officer training in the USSR. This was postponed, due to the immediate Japanese threat, but Batsaikhan was promoted to corporal in the meantime. The Soviet Union and Japan, through their client states of Mongolia and Manchukuo, had been in a state of great tension over the border since 1931, though no war had been declared.

By late 1934, Corporal Batsaikhan and his unit were stationed along the Mongolia-Manchukuo border. In January 1935, he and a small party of cavalrymen journeyed to a small disputed area on the border near Buir Lake, and proceeded to ambush a Japanese-Manchukuo force at the Battle of Khalkhyn Temple. The Japanese set up a temporary base nearby, and Corporal Batsaikhan led an attack which destroyed the base and threw back the Japanese, though not without casualties. The Mongolian soldiers soon withdrew to avoid further losses, and the Japanese soon retook the area. For the rest of 1935, Batsaikhan was involved in several other clashed cross-border raids. By early 1936, the Japanese and Manchurian forces in the area had been building up strength for some time, and Corporal Batsaikhan and his men were committed to a limited attack on the village of Tauran, which they captured in March 1936. However, the Japanese swiftly counterattacked, and the Mongolian-Soviet forces were thrown out of their recently gained positions. Batsaikhan took part in a limited retaliatory raid in April, but the damage had been done.

Batsaikhan had, however, impressed the Soviet officers sufficiently enough that he was hand-picked to become an officer. In August 1936, Batsaikhan journeyed to Novosibirsk in Russia, where he underwent officer training at a Red Army institution, as well as learning the Russian language. By late 1938, he was officially commissioned as a lieutenant in the Mongolian People's Army, and went back to Mongolia in January 1939, returning to his old unit in the 8th Cavalry Division, becoming a troop commander. By this time, the Japanese and Manchukuo forces on the border had been engaged in strongly fortifying their positions.

In May 1939, Lieutenant Batsakhian led his troop into an area which had been in dispute for some time. Though they were not on a raid or military mission, they were attacked by the Manchurians and were forced to retreat over the Khalkha River. Batsaikhan later led a counterattack which pushed back the Manchurians, establishing defensive postions and repulsing several further enemy assaults. This small skirmish soon escalated into the Battles of Khalkhin Gol. The Mongolians later surrounded and destroyed a Japanese force sent to evict them. Throughout June, small-scale clashes between the two sides intensified. In July, the Japanese launched their main attack, crossing the Khalkha River and pushing Batsaikhan and his men off Baintsagan Hill. The Mongolians retreated and joined their Soviet counterparts, repelling a Japanese advance over the Kawatama Bridge and counterattacking. Later in the month, Lieutenant Batsaikhan and his men repelled a similar attack on the bridge by the Japanese. By August, the front had stabilized, and the Soviet-Mongolian force prepared to counterattack. A probing action led by Batsaikhan was thrown back with heavy losses, and a Japanese counterattack forced the 8th Division to abandon several key strategically important hills. By late August, the stalemate had gone on far too long and the Soviet-Mongolian forces began their final assault. Attacking from the east bank of the Khalkha, Batsaikhan led his men in a flanking attack, surrounding a large Japanese force and inflicting significant casualties. The Mongolians also repelled several counterattacks and breakout attempts, and ended the month having eliminated all Japanese forces in Mongolian territory. A ceasefire signed on September 15, 1939 went into effect the next day, ending the fighting between the Soviet Union and the Empire of Japan.

The defeat at Khalkhin Gol made the Japanese give up their dreams of northern imperial expansion. The Soviet Union, too, wanted to shift its focus to the west, where Nazi Germany was quickly gaining territory. As such, the Soviets and Japanese signed a non-agression pact on April 1941. Lieutenant Batsaikhan stayed in the army, retaining his position as a cavalry commander. His unit was still frequently stationed on the border with Manchuria, should the Japanese attack again. When the Soviet Union was invaded by Nazi Germany in June, Batsaikhan requested a transfer to the Red Army to fight the Germans, which was denied. He did, however, donate a portion of his earnings as an officer to the Soviet war effort in a patriotic gesture, and called on his fellow Mongolians to support the Soviet Union as much as they could. After the victory at Stalingrad, it was clear that Germany would eventually be defeated and that the Soviet Union would have to resume its war with Japan. As such, the Soviet-Mongolian forces on the border began to build up their strength. Batsaikhan was promoted twice, first to senior lieutenant in 1942 and subsequently to captain in March 1943, and he was assigned to command a cavalry squadron in his battalion. The Mongolian soldiers spent the next few years preparing for offensive action against Manchuria. Nazi Germany was defeated in May 1945, and an attack on Japanese territory was sure to come in the next few months.

On August 9, 1945, the Soviet Union declared war on Japan. Immediately, the Soviet forces conducted a three-pronged invasion of Manchuria, with the southern pincer, which Captain Batsaikhan and the Mongolian cavalry, advancing through Inner Mongolia. Advancing rapidly through the Inner Mongolian desert, Batsaikhan and the rest of the 8th Division pushed forwards against feeble resistance from Japanese and Manchukuo forces, with their objectives being to reach Zhangjiakou. They encountered a more determined defense from Japanese troops in the Khangbao area, but Captain Batsaikhan and his men easily overcame this, and in just a few days of fighting, they had captured Zhangjiakou. Here, the attack concluded, having destroyed the Manchukuo Imperial Army, captured scores of prisoners, and achieved all its objectives in a very short amount of time. After the fighting ceased, Batsaikhan and the Mongolians of the 8th Division crossed over the Great Wall of China and linked up with Chinese forces who had recently liberated Beijing. On September 2, 1945, the Empire of Japan surrendered unconditionally to the Allied powers, ending the war in the east.

### Ili Rebellion

Since 1944, Soviet-backed Turkic rebels had been waging an insurgency in Xinjiang against Kuomintang forces of the Republic of China, a remote theater of the Chinese Civil War. When it looked as if the fighting might spill over into Mongolia, Captain Batsaikhan, who had returned to his family in Töv Province after the end of the war, was called to serve on Mongolia's southwestern border, and he arrived in 1946 with his cavalry squadron.

Fighting along the border was common, and Chinese forces frequently attacked Mongolian positions, who in turn raided their defenses in Xinjiang. After leading a number of cross-border raids against the Chinese, Captain Batsaikhan and his men were ordered to join in an invasion of Xinjiang. In June 1947, the Mongolians attacked, pushing back the Chinese and their Kazakh allies in the Battle of Baitag Bogd. They successfully took Beitashan, but Batsaikhan and his men encountered stiffer resistance from the Chinese as they tried to advance further. With the lines more or less stabilized, the Mongolian and Chinese forces continued to attack each other. Captain Batsaikhan and his men found it more and more difficult to make successful attacks as the Chinese reinforced their positions throughout 1947. In January 1948, he and his unit were withdrawn back into Mongolian territory after Chinese soldiers attacked at Khobdo, where they joined the defense and successfully repelled the Chinese attack. Eventually, the cross-border attacks became less and less frequent, and stopped altogether in July 1948.

### Retirement

After the mission in Xinjiang, Captain Batsaikhan remained in the army, and he was garrisoned in Ulaanbaatar for a number of years. He was promoted to major in 1952. Major Batsaikhan's duties during the period of peace included protection of local communist establishments throughout the country, as well as close collaboration with Soviet forces.

In June 1956, Major Ganbaatar Batsaikhan announced his formal retirement from the Mongolian People's Army.

## Later life

Immediately after retirement, Batsaikhan found work as an office clerk at the MPR Party headquarters in Ulaanbaatar. In 1958, he married Chuluunbold Narantuyaa, a secretary at his office. They opted for a traditional Mongolian wedding, and had two children: Tsetsegmaa and Ivaanjav.

In the late 1950s, the Sino-Soviet split resulted in tensions between the two Communist nations. Mongolia was firmly in the Soviet sphere, and with many Soviet troops sent to garrison Mongolia preparing for military action against the People's Republic of China, Batsaikhan stated his willingness to return to the army should the need ever arise.

Batsaikhan and Narantuyaa lived together in an apartment in Ulaanbaatar, occasionally visiting each other's families in the countryside. Narantuyaa passed away in 1998 of acute liver failure after her body reacted badly to proscribed medicine. Batsaikhan died a year later of old age.

### Views

Batsaikhan was a Communist, and a supporter of Khorloogiin Choibalsan and his Mongolian People's Revolutionary Party for many years. However, his support of the party waned as he got older, and in 1990, he supported the the pro-democracy protestors in the Mongolian Revolution which ended Communist rule in Mongolia. After the collapse of the Communist regime, information on the purges conducted in the late 1930s, which Batsaikhan avoided as he was in the Soviet Union studying at the time, became readily available. He was horrified when he learned of the massacres, especially those of Buddhist clergy, and expressed great regret at the excesses committed under the regime.

## Equipment

As a Soviet-equipped cavalry officer, Batsaikhan used a Mosin-Nagant M1907 carbine, Tokarev TT-33 pistol, and RGD-33 fragmentation grenades. In 1944, just before the invasion of Manchuria, he was equipped with an M1944 carbine, an updated version of the M1907, and used in in Manchuria and in Xinjiang.