The two primary goals of Ichi-go were to open a land route to French Indochina, and capture air bases in southeast China from which American bombers were attacking the Japanese homeland and shipping.

[15] The IJA mobilized 500,000 troops, 100,000 horses, 1,500 pieces of artillery, 800 tanks, 15,000 mechanised vehicles,[16] and 200 bombers for the offensive.

[19] China entered the war in 1937 with a primarily agrarian economy and quickly lost much of its industrial capacity to the Japanese.

[20] Maintaining the forces needed to stay in the war imposed an unsustainable burden on an economy further weakened by blockade, shortages of staple goods, poor weather, and inflation;[21][22] there was widespread famine from 1942.

The government responded to the economic pressure, reduced Japanese activity after December 1941, and the lack of offensive capability by encouraging the military to produce its own food.

At the Cairo Conference in November 1943, China agreed to major combined operations in Burma on the condition that the Western Allies committed significant resources.

[26][27] In January 1944, Chiang warned US President Franklin D. Roosevelt that prioritizing Europe would encourage Japan to attack and knock China out of the war.

[33] On 27 April, after the start of Ichi-Go, China received French intelligence from Indochina of the Japanese goal of securing the rail corridor.

[17] The first phase of Ichi-Go, codenamed Kogo,[37] was for capturing the Beijing–Hankou railway in Henan and destroying the ROC's First War Zone.

[41] The local population - alienated by wartime deprivation, state corruption, and the First War Zone's aggressive requisitions - also withheld support.

[42] Incidents included civilians attacking Chinese troops, stealing abandoned weapons,[43][19] and refusing to obey orders to destroy highways.

[45] On 29 May, the ROC Military Affairs Commission ordered Changsha to be held to defend USAF air bases and maintain American confidence; the option of abandoning railway and retreating south-east to Guilin was rejected.

[39] Chiang assigned General Fang Xianjue, whom he trusted, to command the city,[46] A relief force from Guangdong was organized.

[47] Japanese forced entered Guangxi in early September 1944 and quickly captured United States air bases at Guilin, Liuzhou, and Nanning.

[18]: 21  Leaders of the Guangxi Clique like General Bai Chongxi decided that neither Guilin nor Liuzhou could be successfully defended and Chinese forces abandoned those cities.

[18]: 21 In late November 1944, the Japanese advanced slowed approximately 300 miles from Chongqing as it experienced shortages of trained soldiers and materiel.

[18]: 21  Although Operation Ichi-Go achieved its goals of seizing United States air bases and establishing a potential railway corridor from Manchukuo to Hanoi, it did so too late to impact the result of the broader war.

Before the US bases were overrun, the mission had left China and returned to Burma [50] Toward the end of Ichi-Go, ROC 8th War Zone in Guizhou − with five armies and used to contain the Chinese Communists − was redeployed to fight the Japanese.

[3] According to Cox, China suffered 750,000 casualties, including soldiers who simply "melted away" and those rendered combat ineffective besides being killed or captured.

[6] After the battle of Central Henan, Chiang Kai-shek convened with his generals in a series of meetings starting from the 21st of July that would be known as the Huangshan Conference (黃山整軍會議).

[18]: 24–25  The Nationalist army increasingly turned to raiding villages to press-gang peasants into service and force marching them to assigned units.

[60][61] In Chiang's view, Stillwell had moved too many Chinese forces into the Burma campaign, leaving China insufficiently protected.

Although Chiang was successful in removing Stilwell, the public relations damage suffered by his Chinese Nationalist Party (Kuomintang) regime was irreparable.

Right before Stilwell's departure, New York Times war correspondent Brooks Atkinson interviewed him in Chongqing and wrote:The decision to relieve General Stilwell represents the political triumph of a moribund, anti-democratic regime that is more concerned with maintaining its political supremacy than in driving the Japanese out of China.

The Generalissimo [Chiang Kai-shek] naturally regards these armies as the chief threat to the country and his supremacy... has seen no need to make sincere attempt to arrange at least a truce with them for the duration of the war... No diplomatic genius could have overcome the Generalissimo's basic unwillingness to risk his armies in battle with the Japanese.

This view was shared by many U.S. journalists in China at the time, but due to pro-Chiang Allied press censorship, it was not as well known to their readers until Stilwell's recall and the ensuing anti-Chiang coverage forced it into the open.

As a result, future Japanese attempts to fight into Sichuan, such as in the Battle of West Hunan, ended in failure.

Chinese Communist guerrillas were able to exploit this confusion to gain influence and control of greater areas of the countryside in the aftermath of Ichi-Go.

[66] This along with the aforementioned rapid deterioration of the Nationalist forces, Nationalist unpopularity both internally and abroad, Communist popularity both internally and externally, Kuomintang corruption and other factors allowed the Communists to gain victory in the resumed Chinese Civil War after World War II.

[68] The 1958 novel The Mountain Road, by Theodore White, a Time magazine correspondent in China at the time of the offensive, was based on an interview with former OSS Major Frank Gleason, who led a demolition group of American soldiers during the offensive that were charged with blowing up anything left behind in the retreat that might be of use to Japan.