Topic 6 Lesson 1
The Sino-Japanese War
The Japanese Attack
The Rise of Japanese militarism
The Japanese did not want a united China and just half a year after the Sian incident
and the adoption of a United Front in China, encouraged by the rise of Nazism and
Fascism in Europe, young officers engineered the Marco Polo bridge incident about
10 miles north of Peking and used it as an excuse to attack the garrison. Once
hostilities had begun and with the failure of hopes for a peace settlement, the
Nationalist government became fiercely anti-Japanese and the Japanese were locked
into a war of attrition that lasted until the end of World War Two in 1945. It
exhausted Japan and the nationalist government and paved the way for the triumph of
the Communists in China. The Marco Polo incident was a product of a militarist antdemocratic movement. They wanted a “Showa restoration”, a union of emperor,
soldiers, and peasants in depression hit Japan. Conspiracies, plots, and assassination
were all part of their “sacred” mission. Older officers did not like this younger
rebellion but they could not be stopped. “Throughout the period of 1932-36 the
militarists rose steadily in national politics until they eclipsed the party government.
It was a tragedy for modern Japan.” 695
In 1932 they launched two coups and killed foreign ministry and business leaders
culminating in the murder of Premier Inukai Tsuyoshi who had disproved of the
military action in China and wanted a negotiated settlement. At the trial they aired
their views, attacking weak politicians, corrupt bureaucrats, and selfish zaibatsu. The
idea of civil government stumbled on till 1938 but it had been fatally wounded. A
nationalist and then an admiral became premier and the country drifted towards
fascism and totalitarianism.
There was now a dispute between the imperial way faction of young officers who
wanted military expansion, aggrandizement in Asia and direct action in China. Older
officers supported the Control Faction, which also wanted expansion in Asia but
wanted “to gain influence through legal means and proper channels.” 697
There was another plot to kill the entire cabinet in 1933 but it was discovered. The
assassins were only tried in 1937 and released from prison in 1941. The control
faction tried to assert control by changing the general responsible for military
education, but the officer who masterminded this plan was assassinated in 1935. In
1936 on February 26 1,400 soldiers and 26 officers stormed the Diet, the War
Department and the police station. A minister, the brother in law of the Premier, and
the military education general were all killed and the troops only surrendered when
they were surrounded by loyal troops. 13 rebel officers were executed and generals
Ataki and Mazaki were imprisoned.
Admiral Okada resigned in March 1936 and Hirota Koki became premier. He was
extremist, supported and aggressive China policy, and appointed military approved
personnel to his cabinet. He wanted China to recognise Manchuko, to bind China,
Manchuko and Japan into an economic union, and joint defence against Communism.
The Chinese government proposed Chinese territorial integrity, nonimpairment of
China’s sovereignty and a relationship based on equality. No agreement was reached.
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Japan then tried to get 5 northern provinces to form an autonomous association, while
the Chinese set up their own Hupeh-Chahar political council. Part of Nanking was
occupied, and popular discontent rose. A national boycott reduced the market for
Chinese goods by two thirds. The Japanese then issued demands for 1) end to all antiJapanese activities in China, 2) recognition of Japan’s special position in Northern
China, 3) Sino-Japanese collaboration against Communism especially in Outer
Mongolia, 4) Sino-Japanese economic cooperation, and 5) Japanese advisors in all
areas of government. It was similar to the 21 demands. China countered with
demands for 1) the end of all smuggling, 2) withdrawal of Japanese troops from
Hopeh and Chahar, and 3) suppression of Japanese sponsored autonomous
movements. 699
Internationally Hirota signed the anti-Comintern pact with Germany and Italy in 1936
isolating the Soviet Union, and prepared for war against Britain and the United States.
Japan became a totalitarian state.
In 1936 his government fell, another government fell advocating negotiations fell, and
a military government led by Prince Konoe Fumimarco came to power, with the
Japanese chief of staff General Tojo advocating the use of force against China. His
ideas were rejected but the Japanese army in North China decided to go it alone and
provoked the Marco Polo Bridge clash on July 7 1937.
The Outbreak of War 1937
Under the Boxer protocol the Japanese were permitted to station troops between
Peking and the sea. Under the pretext that a Japanese soldier was missing the
Japanese demanded the right to enter the city of Wamping before midnight on July
7th. When the Chinese garrison commander refused the Japanese bombarded the city
and occupied it at 4.30 thus beginning the undeclared war between the two countries.
This excuse was not valid, but once hostilities began the Japanese poured in
reinforcements from Manchuria and from the home islands of Japan. The Chinese
were determined to fight and Chiang Kai-shek declared that when pushed to the
extreme China would have no choice but “to throw the last ounce of energy” into “a
struggle for national survival.” 701
He still though tried to have a peace agreement, but having being forced to fight
declared that the KMT, the CCP, the youth, all Chinese should fight the enemy.
Disparaging China’s ability to fight, Russia was still the main enemy, the Japanese
did not want to become bogged down into a long continental war and believed that
they could achieve victory within three months. The Japanese prepared to attack
Peking in late July, but to spare the cities destruction and the destruction of its
treasures, the Chinese withdrew from the city on the 28th of July. In August the
Japanese began their attack in Shanghai and Chiang Kai-shek through in his two best
German trained divisions, the 87th and the 88th, and they held out for three months.
The losses were terrible and Chinese morale increased but the Japanese outflanked the
defenders and defence unexpectedly collapsed. 702
The Japanese then marched on the Chinese capital of Nanking. The Germans then
tried to mediate, fearing the Chinese would be driven into seeking Soviet aid. They
asked for 1) autonomy for inner Mongolia, 2) extension of Japanese power into north
China with the Chinese not being allowed to appoint anti-Japanese officials, 3)
extension of the demilitarised zone in Shanghai, 4) termination of anti-Japanese
activities in China, 5) customs revision in favour of Japan.
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But the Japanese attacked and Nanking fell on December 12th. The Japanese then
demanded that the Chinese 1) abandon their anti-Japanese policy and unite with Japan
and Manchuko in a anti-Communist alliance, 2) to pay a reparation to Japan, 3) to
sign a treaty of economic cooperation with Japan and Manchuko, 4) to accept
demilitarised agencies with autonomous zones within them.
It was an ultimation and the German general advising the nationalists, General
Falkenhausen was advised to instruct the Chinese about the inadvisability of fighting
a prolonged war. The capital was moved to Chungking while Chiang remained in
Wuhan to direct military operations while schools, factories and other instructions
were withdrawn inland. The southwest became a new zone of resistance to the
Japanese and Japanese hopes of a quick victory were dashed.
The fall of Nanking was accompanied by the massacre of about 100,000 people and
countless women were raped. So bad were the atrocities that the Japanese tried to
keep it secret from home and they only became known in Japan during the war trials.
The Japanese then advanced in North China towards Hsuchow but they encountered
heroic resistance and 3,000 were killed. In June 1938 the Chinese broke the Yellow
river dikes to slow the advancing Japanese.
At Wuhan 12 Japanese divisions advanced on the city from two directions. After
several hundred small and large encounters the city finally fell and Wuhan was
captured on December 25 1938, two months after Canton which had fallen on October
21st. Nationalist leaders collapsed into despair and despondency but Chiang fought
on.
“The fall of Wuhan marked the end of the first phase of the war, which lasted sixteen
months. During the period the Chinese traded space for time and enticed the enemy
deep into the hinterland. Correspondingly, the Japanese strategy for quick victory
bogged down, mired deep in the abdomen of China from which it could not extricate
itself.” 704
The next stage from 1938 until the attack on Pearl Harbour in December 1941 – was
one of attrition, in which the Japanese occupied the cities and communications in
Eastern China while the Chinese fought a policy of strategic withdrawals and guerrilla
warfare. The Japanese occupied the cities while the Chinese occupied the vast
Chinese countryside and the front stabilized. 704
The civilians suffered terribly. “The Japanese bombed noncombatants, torpedoed
fishing boats, strafed civilians, bayoneted ex-soldiers tied in batches of fifty, and
burned, looted, and raped.” 704
The Japanese were so reckless that they attacked neutrals and the American gunboat
Panay was sunk by the Japanese outside Nanking on December 12th 1937.
“International sanctions were slow in coming for Europe itself was threatened by
Nazism and Fascism, and the United States still clung to her neutrality.” 704
But the Japanese had to realise that they could not win a quick victory, and attempted
to live off the areas they had conquered by creating puppet governments, with an
“independent Mongolian government being formed in October 29th 1937 for inner
Mongolia, Two Chinese puppet governments were formed around Peking and
Nanking under Wang K’e-ming and Liang Hung-chih. 704
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