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• 1983-08-05
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• Vancouver, BC
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• 2003-08-02
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• Writer; Part-Time Hero
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• James
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• Visiting eight different myO friends in person thus far
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• Winter 2001
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• Neon Genesis Evangelion, .hack//SIGN, Naruto, Bleach, Beck, Peacemaker Kurogane, Ranma 1/2 (the guilty pleasure)
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• Visit the myO friends I've missed thus far; complete a cosplay from 300
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• Writing, Gaming, Kung Fu, Movies, Acting somewhat strange in general
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• Can recognise most quotes from almost any movie/show on first listen; Can recite the entire 12 days of Christmas by memory
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Thursday, November 10, 2005
The Early War Years: China, 1931-1937.
Most people'll tell you that the Second World War started in 1939 when Germany invaded Poland. They tend to not count the years China spent holding back the Japanese prior . . .
So in 1931 - eight years before the war "started" - Japan invaded and occupied Manchuria east of China-proper and Russia. They then created the puppet state of Manchukuo governed by the last emperor of China Henry Puyi. Though no one acknowledged the legitimacy to the new country's independance or to Japan's occupation, a truce was negotiated in the same year.
In 1932, the Japanese attacked China directly at what was known as the Chahar province, which was known as "The War of Resistance at the Great Wall." To put it into perspective, the Japanese were armed with the latest weapons and tactics; the Chinese were fighting with obsolete rifles and spears. Yes, spears. The province fell quickly, and all the areas west of Beijing were now under Japanese occupation. The following year, Japan annexed the province of Rehe for the alleged security of Manchukuo. From that, all Chinese land north of the Great Wall was lost.
For the next four years, Japan continued installing puppet governments throughout all their Chinese gains in an attempt to eventually annex all of China. TO get a sense of how ludicrous this actually was, one puppet government was known as "The East Ji Anti-Communist Autonomous Administration".
It doesn't take much to explain that this was gonna eventually turn into all-out war. It happened in the June of 1937, at a bridge in Southern Beijing.
The bridge in question, known as the "Marco Polo Bridge", "Lugou Bridge", and "Roko Bridge" depending on where you're from, was a key supply-route for Beijing from the main Kuomingtang positions; the Japanese occupied the North, West, and South sides of the bridge.
How the fighting began is under dispute. Allegedly, Japanese forces at the west of the bridge were practicing when they found that a soldier was missing and presumed hiding in the town the Chinese forces were set. The Japanese demanded that the army be allowed in to search for this soldier - not surprisingly, the Chinese colonel refused. That evening, the Japanese responded with an ultimatum that they be let in within the hour lest they start firing on the town . . .
At midnight, the Japanese artillery - already zeroed in on the town - let fly while several hundred troops stormed over the bridge. The Chinese quickly assembled about 1000 men and defended the position "at all costs". Through force of numbers, the Japanese were held back and they halted their attack for the time being.
For weeks, tense negotiations were undertaken to soothe the "July 7th incident". The end result was that the Japanese army made more demands: that the Kuomingtang must wipe out all anti-Japanese movements in the cities, that they must take responsibility for what had happened at the bridge on July 7th, and that General Song, commander of the Kuomingtang army, must apologise.
Though the Chinese worked to quickly appease the demands (General Song was more or less unavailable during the entire time), it was all for naught and the moment the local Chinese officer returned to Beijing for instructions, the Japanese attacked the bridge once again.
To fully appreciate what these early battles were like, one must understand the Chinese situation. While undoubtedly superior in numbers to the Japanese and with knowledge of the lay of the land, they were also fighting as civilian militias with minimal modern weapons and often relying on spears and broadswords - as well, they were almost all foot soldiers with no tanks and no airplanes.
Over the course of the week, the Japanese had taken the bridge, the local towns, and eventaully with little resistance Beijing itself. Chinese forces continued to be steamrolled for much of the early years, and many, many horrible things took place during this time (like the situation at Nanjing).
I don't have any numbers for these early battles of the Sino-Japanese War that took place concurrently with the rest of the world . . . but what I do have are the final numbers in 1945. By the end of the war, 1.1 million Japanese casualties left the fighting in China. The Chinese, meanwhile, had suffered over 20 million casualties - 17.5 million of them being non-military.
It's funny to think about how school lessons are tailor-made to suit the class they're teaching. In Australia you learn about Gallipoli and ANZAC; in Canada, you learn about Vimy Ridge, Dieppe, and The Atlantic; in the United States, you learn about Iwo Jima, The Bulge, and Normandy. Rarely do we ever hear about all the things happening in Asia, long before our respective countries entered the war . . .
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