Relations between the USSR and Japan in 1938 cannot be called friendly even with the greatest stretch.
As a result of the intervention against China on part of its territory, namely in Manchuria, the pseudo-state of Manchukuo, controlled from Tokyo, was created. From January 1938, Soviet military specialists took part in the hostilities on the side of the army of the Celestial Empire. The latest equipment (tanks, aircraft, air defense artillery systems) was shipped to the ports of Hong Kong and Shanghai. It wasn't hidden.
By the time the conflict broke out on Lake Khasan, Soviet pilots and their Chinese colleagues had already destroyed dozens of Japanese planes in the air and carried out a series of bombing attacks on airfields and military bases. They also sank the Yamato aircraft carrier in March.
A situation has ripened in which the Japanese leadership, striving for the expansion of the empire, was interested in testing the strength of the ground forces of the USSR. The Soviet government, confident in its capabilities,behaved no less decisively.
The conflict at Lake Hassan has its own history. On June 13, the Manchurian border was secretly crossed by Genrikh Samuilovich Lyushkov, the authorized representative of the NKVD, who oversaw intelligence work in the Far East. Having gone over to the side of the Japanese, he revealed to them many secrets. He had something to say…
The conflict on Lake Khasan began with a seemingly insignificant fact of reconnaissance of Japanese topographic units. Any officer knows that the preparation of detailed maps precedes an offensive operation, and this was precisely what the special units of the potential enemy were doing on the two border hills Zaozernaya and Bezymyannaya, near which the lake is located. On July 12, a small detachment of Soviet border guards occupied the heights and dug in.
It is possible that these actions would not have led to an armed conflict near Lake Khasan, but there is an assumption that it was the traitor Lyushkov who convinced the Japanese command of the weakness of the Soviet defense, otherwise it is difficult to explain the further actions of the aggressors.
On July 15, a Soviet officer shoots a Japanese gendarme, who clearly provoked him to this act, and kills him. Then postmen begin to violate the border with letters demanding to leave the skyscrapers. These actions were not successful. Then, on July 20, 1938, the Japanese ambassador in Moscow gives the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs Litvinov an ultimatum, which produced approximately the same effect as the mentioned postal items.
On July 29, the conflict began on Lake Khasan. To storm the heightsZaozernaya and Bezymyanny went Japanese gendarmes. There were few of them, only a company, but there were only eleven border guards, four of them died. A platoon of Soviet soldiers hastened to help. The attack was repulsed.
Further - more, the conflict at Lake Hassan was gaining momentum. The Japanese used artillery, then the forces of two regiments captured the hills. An attempt to knock them out immediately was unsuccessful. They demanded from Moscow to destroy the heights together with the aggressor's troops.
Heavy TB-3 bombers were lifted into the air, they dropped more than 120 tons of bombs on the enemy fortifications. The Soviet troops had such a tangible technical advantage that the Japanese simply had no chance of success. Tanks BT-5 and BT-7 were not very effective on swampy ground, but the enemy did not have such.
August 6, the conflict on Lake Khasan ended with the complete victory of the Red Army. Stalin drew from it the conclusion about the weak organizational qualities of the commander of the OKDVA, V. K. Blucher. It ended badly for the latter.
The Japanese command did not draw any conclusions, apparently believing that the reason for the defeat was only the quantitative superiority of the Red Army. Ahead was Khalkhin Gol.
