Totalitarian MartyrsCJackson

Christopher Jackson

Totalitarian Martyrs

The conflicts between Asian states may not be as popular as European or American ones but they are still just as bloody. Japan’s war occupation of North China is not an exception to this as the Japanese were fully capable of ruthlessness. As in all wars, there was a body count as the Japanese made their way inland. Though upsetting much like other wars there was violence, brutality, and massacres. One such massacre happened in Nanjing along with other outrageous atrocities.
The taking place in the 1930s the massacre in Nanjing was a tactic taken during the Sino Japanese war. Though outright murders, vandalism, and other war crimes were committed the Japanese basically got away with it. Between being covered up or not acknowledged these crimes did not come to light for years. Though the truth did come out some Japanese were unwilling to call the event a massacre. Takashi Yoshida brings this up in his article, “They argued that the chaotic situation that occurred in Nanjing was not the fault of the Japanese army, but resulted from the fact that Chinese leaders deserted the city leaving chaos in their wake. He claimed that the NM—that is, the event defined as the killing of 200,000- 300,000 civilians—was a fabrication and lashed out at school textbooks that provided such baseless casualty estimates.” (Yoshida, 1)
Attempting to save face in the eyes of the world is understandable. Though considering the crimes committed by other nations it is surprising that Japan does not point fingers. After all, in a war, there are those who submit and those who are dead. Things such as killing and mass destruction are a relatively unavoidable part of fighting a war. At the very least the conflict did not leave china damaged beyond repair.

Image Source:
http://eng.the-liberty.com/files/2015/04/5778_l.jpg