1939–1940 Winter Offensive

1939–1940 Winter Offensive
	Part of Second Sino-Japanese War
Date	26 November 1939 – 3 April 1940; (4 months, 1 week and 1 day)
Location	Vicinities of Anhui, Guangdong, Hubei, Henan, Hunan, Jiangxi, Shanxi, Shandong and Suiyuan in the Republic of China
Result	Japanese victory
Belligerents
Republic of China	Empire of Japan Mengjiang;
Commanders and leaders
Wei Lihuang; Gu Zhutong; Li Zongren; Xue Yue; Bai Chongxi; Zhang Fakui; Fu Zuoyi; Ma Hongkui	Toshizō Nishio; Hayao Tada; Yasuji Okamura; Rikichi Andō; Naozaburo Okabe
Strength
1,480,353 including Chinese Muslim Cavalry in 122 divisions	850,000 including Mengjiang Cavalry
Casualties and losses
Chinese claims; Main Operations: 64,432 killed; 79,310 wounded; 17,812 missing; 12,013 unspecified casualties; Supporting Operations:; Late November 1939 to the end of January 1940 866 killed; 1,281 wounded; 554 missing; 5,998 unspecified casualties; February and March 1940 4,815 killed or wounded; 2,404 missing; ; Japanese claims; December 1939 to January 1940 150,144 killed; 8,090 captured;	Chinese claims More than 20,000 killed; 9 transport ships damaged or sunk; 11 pieces of assorted artillery captured; ~400 captured; Japanese claims; December 1939 to January 1940 7,406 deaths 6,556 combat deaths; ; 29,730 wounded;

The 1939–1940 Winter Offensive (Chinese: 冬季攻勢) was a major engagement between the National Revolutionary Army and Imperial Japanese Army during the Second Sino-Japanese War. It constitutes the first major counter-offensive on multiple fronts of Chinese forces in the war. Although it failed to achieve its original objectives, later studies have shown that it came as a blow to the Japanese forces. The Japanese military command had not expected the Chinese to be able to launch an offensive operation at such a large scale.

By April 1940, the Japanese army had successfully fought the operation to a halt. However, a Japanese counter-offensive to seize Ningxia failed and was defeated in Suiyuan by Chinese Muslim forces.