Editor's note: "The Cambridge History of China" is a well-known historical work at home and abroad, in which the text of the Nanjing Massacre is only a paragraph, and the language is vague and understated, whether it is a deliberate transfer or its own ambiguity, this is the historian's narrative concept, or the difference in historical views, or the obscuration of interests, which is worth thinking about.
The following excerpts are Chinese words for reflection only.
Initial campaigns and strategies, 1937-1939
The fighting began in the darkness of the night shortly before midnight on July 7, 1937. According to the Gengzi Agreement, since 1901, Japan has stationed troops between Beiping and Tianjin in northern China. And on that warm summer night, a squadron of Japanese troops held a field exercise near the Lugou Bridge (Marco Polo Bridge), 15 kilometers from Peiping, where the strategic railway hub that controlled all communication with southern China was located. The Japanese suddenly claimed that they had been shot by Chinese soldiers. 1 Urgent roll call found that one of their soldiers was missing. Therefore, they asked to enter the nearby wanping city of Chinese garrison to search. Chinese refused, and they tried to storm the town, but failed. This was the initial conflict of the war.
Japan must ultimately take responsibility for this war, and this is not a problem. At least from the "Twenty-One Articles" requirement in 1915, and especially from the capture of Manchuria in 1931, their record of invading China is notorious. However, exactly what happened at the Lugou Bridge, and why it happened, remains debatable. Usually Chinese argue that the Japanese deliberately provoked war. Japan's alleged goal is to separate North China from the jurisdiction of the Nanjing government; By seizing control of the Lugou Bridge, the Wanping area, they were able to control the passage to Beiping, thus forcing the commander of the Twenty-ninth Army and General Song Zheyuan, chairman of the Jicha Administrative Affairs Committee, to become a submissive puppet. Furthermore, and the argument that followed was that the Japanese, seeing the growing unity of the Chinese, intended to establish their rule over the Chinese mainland before the Kuomintang became powerful.
There is no shortage of evidence to support this argument. For example, in September 1936, the Japanese took advantage of a similar incident to capture Fengtai, which spanned the Beiping-Tianjin railway. Later that year, they had made a futile attempt to buy about 1,000 acres of land near Wanping to build barracks and an airfield. In the spring of 1937, Japanese military commanders also feared that Song Zheyuan was further influenced by Nanjing, thus threatening their position in northern China. In addition, in the week before the incident, Peiping was in a state of tension, and rumors were that the Japanese were about to attack; The Japanese field exercise lasted a week at such a sensitive location as the Lugou Bridge. This is extraordinary and disturbing; Pro-Japanese gangsters are creating riots in Beiping, Tianjin and Baoding. It is also worth noting that on July 9, the Japanese informed Chinese that the soldier who was believed to be missing had returned, apparently he had never been detained or harassed by Chinese.
However, Japanese documents from this period indicate that the Japanese neither deployed nor wanted an incident at the Lugou Bridge. In 1937, the Government of Tokyo was implementing a policy of industrial development as a means of strengthening its military power base; Not long ago, in June, the General Staff Headquarters again ordered its field commander to avoid incidents that could provoke "international disputes." Of course, the Japanese officers in north China were known for not buying the accounts of their Tokyo superiors. However, the size and deployment of the Imperial Army in Northern China on July 7 showed that the commanders of the Field Army were not prepared for the incident. They numbered only 5,000-7,000 men (Song Zheyuan's Twenty-ninth Army was about 10 times the size of this), and most of them were apparently conducting exercises in places that were not prepared to deal with the Lugou Bridge conflict. As a result, only about 135 Japanese troops were involved in the initial battle.
Whether or not the Japanese deliberately provoked the Lugou Bridge war, the incident did not need to lead to a large-scale war, because on July 19 Song Zheyuan signed an agreement to withdraw troops from Wanping, and otherwise fully met the Japanese demands. But there was a larger principled debate among the policymakers in Nanjing and Tokyo, which pushed the two countries into all-out war. The Nationalist Government believes that any solution decided solely by the local authorities in Peiping would support Japan's claim that North China be separated from its jurisdiction. Therefore, it insists on safeguarding all of China's sovereignty in north China. It also advanced several (2-4) divisions from central China to southern Hebei, near Baoding, posing a great threat to the Japanese army in north China. On the other hand, the Japanese base their policy on the principle of excluding Kuomintang power from North China. In the face of Chinese show strength, they were determined not to retreat. So they began to strengthen their own forces in the Pingjin Corridor.
On July 25, the Japanese clashed against Song Zheyuan's army. Three days later, the Japanese commander in north China declared "a war of punishment against the Chinese forces that took action to undermine the prestige of the Japanese Empire." Within four days, thousands of Chinese defenders were killed, while the Japanese controlled the entire Pingjin region. At that time, the policies of both governments became tough. Japanese Prime Minister Fumimaro Konoe claimed on July 27 that he was determined to achieve a "fundamental settlement of Sino-Japanese relations." On July 30, Chiang Kai-shek also declared: "Now we can only lead the people of the whole country, unite the whole country, and struggle to the end."
On August 7, Chiang Kai-shek and his senior advisers formally decided to wage an all-out war of resistance. So he took the biggest and most controversial risk of his life. He decided to shift the main battlefield of the war from North China to Shanghai. The strategists in Nanjing believed that Shanghai was more suitable for combat with Japan than the open land in northern China, because the city's blocked areas would offset Japan's superiority in artillery, tanks, and logistics capabilities. The attack on the Japanese Concession 5 in Shanghai would also divert Japan's attention from the north, making it possible for the Chinese there to strengthen their defenses, especially in the key province of Shanxi. The South also wants to be rewarded politically. Chinese public opinion might have been as supportive of the government as it was in 1932, if it had taken a firm stand in Shanghai. Moreover, fighting a war close to a large foreign community would also attract the attention and sympathy of the Western powers—and possibly interference. 1 Although pro-Kuomintang writers still preached that Chiang's adventure was a great success, the losses may have far exceeded his worst expectations.
On 11 August, Chiang Kai-shek ordered the first three elite divisions—equipped with German weapons and advisers to General Alexander von Falkenhausen and his German staff—to occupy positions within the borders of Greater Shanghai (but outside the areas of foreigners). The Japanese in the city were caught off guard in areas under its control (including the Yangshupu and Hongkou districts of the public concessions, as well as a 1.5-mile-long and half-mile-wide convex angle in the Chinese city's North Hongkou district, see Figure 8), and they rushed to reinforcements. However, when the operation began on August 13 (it is still uncertain which side shot first), the Chinese army was about 80,000, and the Japanese army was only 12,000. The German-trained Chinese army almost drove the Japanese into the Huangpu River for a week. However, later Japanese reinforcements landed on the banks of the Yangtze River north of the city; The battle line expanded; The Chinese army lost their initial advantage.
Battles are devastating. The guns of Japanese warships moored in the nearby Yangtze and Huangpu rivers slammed into Chinese positions within range. The Nanjing government was determined not to retreat and to throw in more troops. During the three-month campaign, some 270,000 Chinese troops — exactly 60 percent of the Nationalist defense force and the core of Chiang Kai-shek's modern army — were killed or wounded. 2 Japanese casualties exceeded 40,000. Countless civilians were also massacred. Much of the city outside the Westerners' concession was destroyed.
In early November, a Japanese amphibious force landed in Hangzhou Bay, 50 miles southwest of Shanghai, and within a week the force threatened the rear of the city's defenders. The Chinese army retreated to Nanjing. However, their retreat was so panicked that they did not stop in front of the elaborate concrete fortifications near Wuxi on the Shanghai-Nanjing Railway, which mimicked the German Hindenburg defense line. Nanjing fell into Japanese hands on December 12-13, 1937. Subsequently, the Japanese offensive slowed down. At the same time, their army did one of the most shameful things in this war- "Nanjing Massacre". During the 7-week atrocity, at least 42,000 Chinese were brutally killed, many of them buried alive or burned with fire. About 20,000 women were raped. The Sino-Japanese War has begun.
Chiang Kai-shek had long tried to avoid hostilities. Since the Nationalists came to power in 1927, he has pursued a policy of reconciliation despite japan's repeated interventions and aggressions. Convinced that China was too weak and divided to resist powerful foreign invaders, he acquiesced to Japan's occupation of the four northeastern provinces (Manchuria), concluded an armistice to eliminate the Influence of the Kuomintang in north China, and succumbed to Japanese pressure to suppress the anti-Japanese student movement. However, from late 1935 onwards, anti-Japanese sentiment had become so strong that the Nationalist government felt that a strong reaction to Japan was indispensable. Thus, after the Xi'an Incident in December 1936, Chiang Kai-shek gradually began preparations for war. He presumably promised verbally that he would resist foreign aggression in exchange for Xi'an's release. As a result, in February 1937 he removed Zhang Qun, the supposedly pro-Japanese foreign minister, and he began negotiations to reconcile with his longtime enemy, the Communists. Therefore, when war broke out at the Lugou Bridge, Chiang Kai-shek had already made up his mind to resist Further Japanese aggression. The whole country unanimously supported him with one voice, achieving unprecedented unity throughout a generation.
Chiang Kai-shek's strategy is based on the principle of "exchanging space for time." He was keenly aware that his army was inferior to Japan', and even before the war he had conceived a strategy for retreating to the remote interior of southwest China. In August 1935, he told a gathering of political cadres, "Even if fifteen of the eighteen provinces of our headquarters have been lost, as long as the three provinces of Sichuan, Yunnan, and Qianqian can be consolidated unharmed, we will certainly be able to defeat any strong enemy and restore all the lost land."
Chiang Kai-shek's confidence was based on the fact that China's economy and society were still in the pre-modern, pre-industrial stage
A kind of understanding. Therefore, he believed that the national war of resistance could be sustained, no matter how many cities and cities there were
Factories fall into the hands of the enemy. In case the invading armies actually advanced into china's almost boundless hinterland, they would
It is bound to be cut off from the source of supply and exhausted. Occasionally, as in Shanghai, he did not insist on exchanging space for time
The principle, however, this strategy, after all, was as he expected, to be a great success. Japanese
It took over the capital centers of northern and eastern China fairly easily and continued along major road and rail lines
Attack, advance quickly. But these traffic arteries do not pass through the mountains and mountains of western China, but are defended in the middle
The Chinese people are hidden behind. As a result, the Japanese were unable to move forward.
Unlike Chiang Kai-shek, the Japanese did not have a pre-conceived strategy or even a goal to pursue in China. From 1934 to 1936, Foreign Minister Hiroshi Hirota systematically put forward three general Japanese demands on China: (1) to suppress anti-Japanese activities; (2) to recognize Manchukuo in fact and establish goodwill relations between Manchukuo, Japan, and China; and (3) to cooperate between China and Japan in eradicating communism. However, the exact meaning of the Three Principles of Hirota has never been clear. After the Lugou Bridge incident, Japanese policymakers had a fierce dispute about their next move. It mainly represents an opinion of the General Staff Headquarters of the Army and opposes the expansion of the Headquarters in China. The gang argues that Japan's war potential is still limited, and that the current Chinese increasingly nationalist and unified, and that their resistance is much more difficult to deal with than in previous years. Yet most of Japan's leaders — both civilian and military — do not understand the importance of the rising tide of Chinese nationalism. They remembered that they had easily occupied Manchuria in 1931-1932, with great contempt for the Chinese army. These main warriors were so optimistic that they claimed to be victorious within three months.
In the early months of the war, Japanese expansionists still had limited ambitions for China. This became even more apparent on November 5, 1937, when the Tokyo government proposed to resolve the Chinese "incident" with terms similar to the Hirota-san principle. However, until December 2, Chiang's government did not agree to negotiations. At that time, Shanghai had fallen, and the Kuomintang army was retreating to Nanjing, completely collapsing. These easy victories have whetted Japan's appetite, and the Tokyo government is no longer willing to negotiate on the basis of its November proposal. Instead, it introduced a new, more demanding set of requirements on December 22. These requirements included: legal recognition of Manchukuo; The demilitarization of North China and Inner Mongolia, the payment of reparations, and, most ominously, the establishment of a "special political institution" in North China that would promote "common prosperity" in Japan, Manchukuo, and China. Chiang's government did not respond to these demands, and Tokyo declared in January 1938 that it was determined to "eliminate" the Nationalist government.
Neither then nor during the subsequent wars, the Japanese expansionists never intended to assume direct administrative responsibility in the Chinese headquarters under peaceful conditions. However, Japanese expansionists did propose the actual conquest of China, especially the five northern provinces, to meet Japan's political aspirations and economic needs. In the atmosphere of chinese fervor and nationalism in 1937-1938, these were conditions that Chiang could not accept, even if he wanted to. After the fall of Nanking, China's resistance did not collapse as the Japanese expansionists had once smugly anticipated. Instead, the seat of the Nationalist government was moved to Chongqing, and Chiang Kai-shek announced a "scorched earth" policy to command the War of Resistance from Wuhan.
So the Japanese made Wuhan their next target. First, however, they struggled to seize control of the main railway linking North and Central China in order to unite their scattered forces. They eventually succeeded in this, although, as in Shanghai, they occasionally encountered heroic and well-commanded resistance troops. For example, in early April 1938, when Japanese troops were massing in Xuzhou, a transportation hub in northern Jiangsu, General Li Zongren's forces lured the attackers into the encirclement of Taierzhuang surrounded by walls. Lee's army inflicted heavy casualties on the Japanese—Chinese claimed that 30,000 Japanese were killed—forcing the remnants of the Japanese to retreat. It was China's first major victory, shattering the myth of the invincibility of the Japanese army. But, as has happened many times in the past, Chinese not to pursue the defeated enemy, so their victory is short-lived. Xuzhou fell on May 19. Japanese commanders in North China and Nanjing can now coordinate their actions in the upcoming Battle of Wuhan.
The Japanese suffered another notable setback in Kaifeng in early June 1938. As they headed west along the Longhai Railway, Chinese suddenly exploded the Yellow River's dam. The Yellow River, which rushes out of its course, crosses the approaching Japanese road and then crosses the Henan Plain into Anhui Province, from where it enters the sea to the south, not to the north, of the Shandong Peninsula. This strategy has worked remarkably. The invaders were temporarily contained, and the Battle of Wuhan was extended for about three months. But the decision to change the course of the Yellow River has been heavily criticized. Indeed, the Kuomintang denied for years that they had deliberately broken the dike. Because the damage caused to ordinary Chinese people even exceeded the damage to the Japanese. About 4,000 to 5,000 villages and 11 large towns are all in the country. More than two million people are said to be homeless and destitute. Even seven years later, all that could be seen in some villages was the curved roofs of temples exposed from the silt of a few feet of river channels, and the branches at the top of bare trees.
However, the determination shown in Shanghai, in Taierzhuang and on the Yellow River was atypical in the resistance of the Kuomintang at the beginning of the war. Many Chinese commanders hesitated and timidly. 2 Most of them have enjoyed local autonomy for a long time and will not risk their lives and power simply to obey Chiang Kai-shek's orders. For example, provincial chairman Han Fuyu shamefully discarded Shandong province to the Japanese, even though he, unlike most, paid with his life for disobeying Chiang's orders. He was executed in January 1938.
Although the Japanese suffered heavy losses in the protracted battle to conquer Wuhan, their superiority in artillery, tanks, and aircraft enabled them to finally take the city on October 25, 1938. Only four days ago, they had actually taken Guangzhou without any resistance. Japanese strategists do believe that Chinese is now going to surrender.
Some members of the Kuomintang government were indeed disgusted by the terrible devastation of the war. For example, the disasters such as the Changsha fire of November 1938, which resulted from Chiang Kai-shek's scorched earth policy, are clear evidence. In addition, after Britain and France sacrificed Czechoslovakia in Munich for peace with Hitler, hopes of foreign intervention against Japan were also frustrated in September 1938. Only Soviet Russia provided aid to China. It has been argued that it did so only to prolong the war and thus weaken the National Government. Thus, it has been argued that the real beneficiaries of the war were the Chinese Communists, who used the respite from the interruption of the Kuomintang campaign against the Communists to expand their territory.
The first spokesman in the government who have doubts about the anti-Japanese policy is Wang Jingwei. As vice president of the Kuomintang, he was nominally the second leading figure in the Nationalist movement. Although Wang was a charismatic politician with a considerable following within the Kuomintang, he wielded very little power in the government dominated by Chiang Kai-shek. Thus, perhaps driven by great political ambitions and the desperation to change the strategy of resistance imposed on the Chinese, he fled from Chongqing on December 18, 1938. Later, under the de facto domination of the Japanese, he established the Restoration Nationalist Government in Nanjing in March 1940 to confront the Chongqing government.
On the part of Chiang Kai-shek, he did not look dejected. He optimistically declared that the abandonment of Wuhan "marked a turning point in our struggle from defense to offense." Although this may seem like a bluff, even the Japanese admit that they have lost the opportunity for a quick victory by failing to crush the Nationalist forces in Wuhan. By this time the Nationalist army had retreated to the rugged mountains beyond the modern communication arteries that had favored the Advance of the Japanese army. The time for the Japanese high command to anticipate victory was not three months, perhaps three years.
——This article is excerpted from the Cambridge History of China and the History of the Republic of China (edited by Fairbank and Cui Ruide, China Social Sciences Press)