nanking massacre death toll

[25] Since then the death toll of the massacre has been a major topic of discussion among historians across the world. [85] The baby was killed with a bayonet. [26][36] For instance, Tokushi Kasahara claims that Nanking's population in 1937 included 400,000 to 500,000 civilians and 150,000 soldiers,[37] whereas David Askew believes it was 200,000 to 250,000 civilians and 73,790 to 81,500 soldiers. "Japanese Atrocities Marked Fall of Nanking After Chinese Command Fled." [108][109], According to documents in the UNESCO Memory of the World Register, at least 300,000 Chinese were killed. As stated in the Judgment of the International Military Tribunal for the Far East, "Estimates indicate that the total number of civilians and prisoners of . Instead of punishing the Japanese troops who were responsible for wholesale rape, "'The Japanese expeditionary Force in Central China issued an order to set up comfort houses during this period of time,' Yoshimi Yoshiaki, a prominent history professor at Chuo University, observes, 'because Japan was afraid of criticism from China, the United States of America and Europe following the case of massive rapes between battles in Shanghai and Nanjing. The Chinese scholars of the committee maintained that at least 300,000 were killed. Rape! [18][23] However, the prosecution at these trials made little effort to verify the accuracy of their death toll estimates and a considerable amount of dubious and now discredited data was accepted by both tribunals. The reason that the [10th Army] is advancing to Nanjing quite rapidly is due to the tacit consent among the officers and men that they could loot and rape as they wish. Some other Japanese military leaders in charge at the time of the Nanjing Massacre were not tried only because by the time of the tribunals they had either already been killed or committed seppuku (ritual suicide). However, Askew notes that Japanese units often exaggerated their body counts. THE RAPE OF NANKING OR NANJING MASSACRE 5 The judges of the International Military Tribunal for the Far East (also known as the Tokyo War Crimes Trials) were prepared to accept that at least 200,000 Chinese civilians and prisoners of war were slaughtered by the Japanese in the six weeks after Nanking fell.The judges were also prepared to accept that the death toll would be much higher if . The number of Chinese killed in the massacre has been . Added in 24 Hours. The slaughter of civilians is appalling. From Judgment of the International Military Tribunal, On November 12, 1948, Matsui and Hirota, along with five other convicted Class-A war criminals, were sentenced to death by hanging. Bergamini, David, "Japan's Imperial Conspiracy," William Morrow, New York; 1971. The "Great Massacre School" group supports the validity of the findings at the Tokyo Trials, and concludes that there were at least 200,000 casualties and at least 20,000 rape cases; whereas "The Illusion School" group rejects tribunal findings as "victor's justice". [21], The second type of source is the burial records written down by Chinese charitable associations. [56], In the early 1970s, Japanese historian Hora's estimate of 200,000 massacre victims was challenged for the first time by the journalist Akira Suzuki, who suggested that "several tens of thousands" had been killed. On 13 December, the 6th and the 116th Divisions of the Japanese Army were the first to enter the city, facing little military resistance. [57] Soon after some denialists claimed that no massacre had taken place at all. [135], Mei Xiao-ao, the son of Mei Ju-ao, a Chinese justice who was present at the Tokyo war crime tribunal, published an essay claiming that in the early 1960s, Mei's father, inspired by the recent publication of a Japanese study on the destruction caused by the atomic bombs, tried calling for greater study of the massacre by Chinese historians of the time, but his ideas received a cold reception; he was reportedly accused of "stirring up national hatred and revenge" against the Japanese, and some others felt that writing about "the Chinese defeat and misery in Nanjing amounted to hidden praise for the strength of the Japanese troops. This novel has been translated into Chinese and Russian. Numerological arguments about the death count and distinctions of comparative atrocities do not address this point. The museum notes only that "Chinese soldiers disguised in civilian clothes, which numbered around 4000[34] were severely prosecuted". [52] Kasahara believes that including massacre victims from the surrounding rural parts of Nanking adds 30,000 victims onto the death toll. What happened within the city limits was even more humiliating for humanity. [1] Hence, depending on the timeframe and the geographic scope, an empirically verifiable, scholarly valid victimization range is from over 40,000 to under 200,000.[1]. . [74], The Japanese troops did respect the Zone to an extent; until the Japanese occupation, no shells entered that part of the city except a few stray shots. In 2005, John Rabe's former residence in Nanjing was renovated and now accommodates the ". The Japanese army leadership assigned sections of the safety zone to some units to separate alleged plain-clothed soldiers from the civilians. [13] Timperley included a second estimate in his book published later the same year, Japanese Terror In China, which quoted "a foreign member of the University faculty" as stating that "close to 40,000 unarmed persons were killed within and near the walls of Nanking". The visitor is left to assume they did. [91], Other factors include the mass disposal of Chinese corpses by Japanese soldiers; the revisionist tendencies of both Chinese and Japanese individuals and groups, who are driven by nationalistic and political motivations; and the subjectivity involved in the collection and interpretation of evidence. Many remember the atrocities that occurred to the Jews in the Holocaust, but few remember what is called, "The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II," where 300,000 people were murdered, and 20,000 women were raped (Rivera 2). However, most scholars and historians consider the number to be more than 12,000 victims. In regards to the Nanjing Massacre, Japanese authorities deliberately concealed wartime records, eluding confiscation from American authorities. In August 1937, the Japanese army invaded Shanghai, where they met strong resistance and suffered heavy casualties. The U.S., which served as the melting pot of cultures and is home to descendants of members of both Chinese and Japanese cultures, took up the mantle of investigator for the victimized Chinese. "Convergence or Divergence? In one estimate the Nanking War Crimes Tribunal put the death toll at more than 300,000, though the Tribunal also recorded other estimates including one of 430,000. The two girls were then stripped, the elder being raped by 23 men and the younger by 3. The following is an excerpt: In other words, on the 13th when your troops entered the city, we had nearly all the civilian population gathered in a Zone in which there had been very little destruction by stray shells and no looting by Chinese soldiers even in full retreat. All 27 Occidentals in the city at that time and our Chinese population were totally surprised by the reign of robbery, raping and killing initiated by your soldiers on the 14th. It also lists the Japanese army units that were responsible for each of the deaths and states the way in which the victims were killed. Recent. [132], Before the 1970s, China did relatively little to draw attention to the Nanjing massacre. Improved in 24 Hours. "The International Committee for the Nanking Safety Zone: An Introduction", Askew, David, "The Nanjing Incident: An Examination of the Civilian Population". Recent Historical Writings on the Rape of Nanjing", This page was last edited on 31 December 2022, at 03:33. [124] Kasahara said that if there was a full investigation of the massacre, many other high ranking authorities, which include higher level commanders, army leaders and emperor Hirohito, could have been implicated. According to Navy veteran Sho Mitani, "The Army used a trumpet sound that meant 'Kill all Chinese who run away'. Kasahara generally concludes that the death toll must have been well over 100,000, and possibly around 200,000. [20], The Nanjing garrison force set fire to buildings and houses in the areas close to Xiakuan to the north as well as in the environs of the eastern and southern city gates. Due to multiple factors, death toll estimates vary from 40,000 to over 300,000, with rape cases ranging from 20,000 to over 80,000 cases. Higashinakano had claimed in his book, Thorough Review of Nanjing Massacre, that she and the girl were different persons, and that she was not a witness of the Nanjing massacre, but he was unable to prove this at trial. When I think of the feelings and sentiments of many of my Chinese friends who have fled from Nanjing and of the future of the two countries, I cannot but feel depressed. However, according to historian Tokushi Kasahara, the evidence used to convict Hisao Tani was not convincing. The Nanking Safety Zone was demarcated through the use of Red Cross Flags.[25]. As Nanking fell to the Japanese, and their troops entered the city on the 13th of December, the streets were already crowded with a large number of . [61] After losing the Battle of Shanghai, Chiang Kai-shek knew that the fall of Nanjing was a matter of time. . American missionary John Magee stayed behind to provide a 16mm film documentary and first-hand photographs of the Nanjing Massacre. The death toll has been actively contested among scholars since the 1980s, with typical estimates ranging from 40,000 to over 300,000. [9], The Nanking Massacre was reported internationally within a week of occurring[10] and the first estimate of the full death toll was published on January 24, 1938, in the New China Daily. The total death toll of the Nanjing Massacre is a highly contentious subject in Chinese and Japanese historiography. U.S. news correspondents F. Tillman Durdin and Archibald Steele reported seeing corpses of massacred Chinese soldiers forming mounds six feet high at the Nanjing Yijiang gate in the north. [26][27] However, emotional arguments and political interference in the debate have tended to hinder the construction of an academic consensus on the number of people killed in the atrocity. There was considerable destruction to areas outside the city walls. The total death toll of the Nanjing Massacre is a highly contentious subject in Chinese and Japanese historiography. magazine surveyed members of each "school" for their opinions on the massacre, many of the so-called "centrists" advocated extremely low figures for the total number of victims, including Dokkyo University professor Akira Nakamura, journalist Yoshiko Sakurai, and researcher Toshio Tanabe, who each counted about 10,000 massacred, and military historian Takeshi Hara who selected 20,000. [3][43] A large number of rapes were done systematically by the Japanese soldiers as they went from door to door, searching for girls, with many women being captured and gang-raped. Yoshida has argued that the Nanjing Massacre has figured in the attempts of all three nations as they work to preserve and redefine national and ethnic pride and identity, assuming different kinds of significance based on each country's changing internal and external enemies. Estimates of the number of victims vary based on the definitions of the geographical range and the duration of the event. Many historians including Kasahara view incidents like these where the Japanese fired upon retreating troops to be atrocities, whereas Hata sees them as extensions of combat and not massacres. This is caused by the Army's misbehaviors after the fall of Nanjing and failure to proceed with the autonomous government and other political plans. [21] Historians Haruo Tohmatsu and HP Willmott think that Japanese scholars generally consider the estimate of roughly 40,000 massacre victims to be "the most academically reliable estimate". Rape! Some Chinese men were sodomized and forced to perform "repulsive sex acts". He reasoned that the Nanking Massacre should include the entire area of what was then known as the "Nanking Special Administrative District". historians have been unable to accurately estimate the death toll from the massacre. [107] However, Erwin Wickert, the editor of The diaries of John Rabe, points out that "It is likely that Rabe's estimate is too low, since he could not have had an overview of the entire municipal area during the period of the worst atrocities. Since the area outside the safety zone had been almost completely evacuated, the mopping-up effort was concentrated in the safety zone. [177] Indeed, there is only one sentence that refers to this event: "they [the Japanese troops] occupied that city in December. For example, Edgar Snow stated in his 1941 book, The Battle for Asia, that 42,000 were massacred in Nanking and 300,000 in total between Nanking and Shanghai, figures which were apparently based on these estimates. Other members of the International Committee for the Nanking Safety Zone who took the witness stand included Miner Searle Bates and John Magee. ", Organized and wholesale murder of male civilians was conducted with the apparent sanction of the commanders on the pretext that Chinese soldiers had removed their uniforms and were mingling with the population. The Nanjing Massacre (simplified Chinese: ; traditional Chinese: ; pinyin: Nnjng Dtsh, Japanese: , romanized:Nankin Daigyakusatsu) or the Rape of Nanjing (formerly romanized as Nanking[note 2]) was the mass murder of Chinese civilians in Nanjing, the capital of the Republic of China, immediately after the Battle of Nanking in the Second Sino-Japanese War, by the Imperial Japanese Army. [1] Ikuhiko Hata considers the number of 300,000 to be a "symbolic figure" representative of China's wartime suffering and not a figure to be taken literally. Few numbers have caused such scholarly debate as the death toll estimates of the Nanking Massacre. He met with division commanders, lieutenant-generals Kesago Nakajima and Heisuke Yanagawa, who informed him that the Japanese troops had almost completely surrounded 300,000 Chinese troops in the vicinity of Nanjing and that preliminary negotiations suggested that the Chinese were ready to surrender. [9], The Japanese army conducted its mopping-up operation both inside and outside the Nanking Safety Zone. [35] Three quarters of the population had fled Nanjing before the Japanese arrived. Perhaps all Chinese, regardless of sex or age, seemed marked out as victims. [citation needed], Coordinates: .mw-parser-output .geo-default,.mw-parser-output .geo-dms,.mw-parser-output .geo-dec{display:inline}.mw-parser-output .geo-nondefault,.mw-parser-output .geo-multi-punct{display:none}.mw-parser-output .longitude,.mw-parser-output .latitude{white-space:nowrap}3203N 11846E / 32.050N 118.767E / 32.050; 118.767, A Japanese soldier pictured with the corpses of Chinese civilians by the, Japanese war crimes on the march to Nanjing, Retreating Chinese Troops' Scorched-Earth Policy, Extrajudicial killing of Chinese prisoners of war, Nanking Safety Zone and the role of foreigners, Apology and condolences by the Prime Minister and Emperor of Japan, Denials of the massacre by public officials in Japan, 1. For humanity [ 61 ] After losing the Battle of Shanghai, Chiang Kai-shek knew that the toll... Plain-Clothed soldiers from the civilians concealed wartime records, eluding confiscation from American authorities were sodomized and to... 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Concealed wartime records, eluding confiscation from American authorities was considerable destruction to areas outside city... Toll has been museum notes only that `` Chinese soldiers disguised in civilian clothes, which around. No massacre had taken place at all there was considerable destruction to outside. Possibly around 200,000 a highly contentious subject in Chinese and Russian comparative do... Across the world ; 1971 the surrounding rural parts of Nanking adds victims... Meant 'Kill all Chinese who run away ' run away ' victims the.
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