The Nanking Massacre is the name given to the mass murder, looting, and burning that the Japanese committed in Nanking, the capital of China, over a period of 6 weeks. Beginning on December 13, 1937, the Nanking Massacre is one of the worst crimes against humanity committed on the eve of World War II. Between 40,000 and 300,000 people are claimed to have been killed in total (the general consensus is around 200,000 dead), and although some Japanese officials were found guilty and punished, a significant number were killed with impunity or committed suicide through seppuku. Some of the political leaders who caused the massacre were able to escape sanctions through immunity.
The apocalypse is coming!
December 1937... Shanghai, one of China's port cities, was occupied by the Japanese Empire. The Japanese had not fully recovered from the hatred and resentment they had suffered on the Shanghai front, and morale was very low. In fact, because of these unpleasant circumstances, the Chief of General Staff in Tokyo did not want to take the war any further. Nevertheless, on December 1, 1937, a message came to the commanders of the Central China Regional Army and the 10th Army:
"Prepare the armies for action!"
As soon as they received the order, the commanders wanted to announce to their armies. They said to them:
"You are not going home, your next destination is the capital Nanking. Prepare to attack!"
Hearing this news, the Japanese soldiers waited with hatred and impatience in their hearts and prepared for the attack.
Meanwhile, the official Chinese army, suffering heavy losses on the Shanghai front, was ordered to retreat by Chiang Kai-shek. This was because Chiang Kai-shek planned to push the Japanese into the interior of China and weaken them. This was a logical plan because if the Japanese continued to advance, they would not have the necessary logistics. Chang withdrew his troops from the area, leaving only Tang Shengzhi as commander and only soldiers who had completed their training and had no front-line experience. He sent them the following order:
Defend Nanking at all costs!
After that, the evacuation of the civilian population in the area was prohibited. Roads were closed and boats were destroyed to prevent civilians from leaving the city. Despite this, many civilians disobeyed the order and fled the city, while those who remained faced death, but Tang Shengzhi said in a press release that they would not surrender the city.
Western businessmen and missionaries in Nanking established a *neutral zone (figure 2) in Nanking to protect against the impending Japanese threat. This zone was 3.8 square kilometers. It was as big as Central Park in New York and contained dozens of refugee camps. Although this neutral zone was initially bypassed by the Japanese, it would later become dangerous. On December 1, the Chinese government withdrew, handing the area over to the International Committee led by John Rabe, and the remaining citizens were ordered to enter the Neutral Zone. The Japanese Army also declared that no one in the Neutral Zone would be touched, provided the neutral zone was demilitarized.
*Doomsday
On December 9, the Japanese army laid siege to Nanking Citadel and ordered the soldiers in the citadel to surrender by the next day. When the Chinese army refused, on December 10, Japanese soldiers surrounded the fort and launched a general attack. On December 13, they captured the rest.
The Japanese army entered Nanking on December 13. They started killing everyone, including women, children and the elderly. They looted buildings, burned houses where people lived. This massacre became more and more intense. The commanders organized a different plan for the people in the safe zone, which they would later implement. The Japanese began to vent their hatred, causing great harm to the civilian population. Panic, fear, anxiety... People felt all these feelings. They were anxiously waiting for their turn. Tens of thousands of civilians and thousands of soldiers died in the massacre. Thousands of women were tortured.
After Japanese general Matsui Ivane took control of the city, he ordered his soldiers to "Loot and destroy all the buildings in the city!" gave the order.
Some commanders applied the "no prisoners of war" principle. They also started killing civilians and soldiers who surrendered. The project planned by the commanders was implemented a few days later. People in the neutral zone were told, "Go home, the city is occupied. It's safe here now." They announced and ordered to leave the area. People who believe in this have left the area and started returning to their homes. After that, the massacre intensified. They also started attacking people who left the neutral zone. People who ran into the streets were shot as if they were criminals.
In the river near the city, they killed people by shooting or beating them with sticks, and then threw them into the river. Parents were killed or raped in front of their children. The Japanese even went further and started organizing competitions among themselves. And all this was published in the newspaper "Tokyo Nichi Nichi Shimbun". *It is claimed that the Japanese also used chemical weapons in this massacre.
During this looting, even old women over 70 years old and girls under the age of 8 were sexually abused. The Japanese did not even show mercy to pregnant women, they even killed the baby in the mother's womb.
During the occupation, highly addictive synthetic drugs such as opium and heroin were distributed to the population of Nanking to calm them down. During that period alone, approximately 50,000 people became addicted to heroin.
The Nanking Massacre was one of the attacks that hit China hard. At that time, the capital Nanking, one of the most prosperous cities in China, was famous for its wealth and being one of the commercial centers. The industrial zone was also very large.
The reason for the cessation of these attacks was the emergence of another government in China. Nanking took decades to recover from the attacks. The Communist Party, which would later take over the country, played an important role in healing the wounds of Nanking. Today, many of China's most important commercial centers are located here.
The commanders who carried out the attack were indicted by the Tokyo Military Crimes Tribunal in May 1946 (figure 5). In November 1948, the defendants were tried. Seven were hanged, including Generalissimo Tojo Hideki. 16 people were sentenced to life imprisonment, only 4 of them died in prison. 2 defendants were given a light sentence. The Japanese government paroled the criminals in 1956 and released them unconditionally in 1958. Only 200 people survived the Nanking Massacre. Most of them do not want to be interviewed about the massacre.
The anger over the events in Nanking carried over to this day. The dispute between the citizens of Japan and China continues in this regard. Japanese nationalists made claims about this for propaganda purposes. One was that the massacre never happened; the other was a gross exaggeration of the numbers.
According to Chinese sources, 300,000 civilians and more than 14,000 soldiers were allegedly killed. According to the International War Tribunal for the Far East, there were approximately 200,000 civilian casualties. The massacre also dealt a serious economic blow to China: Nanking, China's capital at the time, was officially destroyed after the invasion. Trade in the city came to a standstill, and the Chinese economy suffered a major blow at the time.
Why the Japanese carried out such a brutal attack has never been explained.
British-American Chinese expert and historian Jonathan Spence writes:
"There is no clear explanation for this terrible event, and none can be found. Expecting an easy victory, the Japanese soldiers instead fought fiercely for months and suffered far more casualties than expected. They were overwhelmed, angry, frustrated, tired. Still undeclared the war had no clear purpose. Perhaps it seemed that all Chinese, regardless of gender or age, were marked as victims."
