Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-t5tsf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-14T19:18:30.950Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

11 - Nationalist China during the Sino-Japanese War 1937–1945

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2008

Get access

Summary

It lasted eight years. Some fifteen to twenty million Chinese died as a direct or indirect result. The devastation of property was incalculable. And after it was over the Nationalist government and army were exhausted and demoralized. Thus it inflicted a terrible toll on the Chinese people and contributed directly to the Communist victory in 1949. The war with Japan was surely the most momentous event in the history of the Republican era in China.

INITIAL CAMPAIGNS AND STRATEGY 1937–1939

The fighting began in darkness, not long before midnight on 7 July 1937. Since 1901, in accordance with the Boxer Protocol, the Japanese had stationed troops in North China between Tientsin and Peiping. And on that balmy summer night, a company of Japanese troops was conducting field manoeuvres near the Lu-kou-ch'iao (Marco Polo Bridge), fifteen kilometres from Peiping and site of a strategic rail junction that governed all traffic with South China. Suddenly, the Japanese claimed, they were fired upon by Chinese soldiers. A quick check revealed that one of their number was missing, where upon they demanded entry to the nearby Chinese garrison town of Wan-p'ing to search for him. After the Chinese refused, they attempted unsuccessfully to storm the town. This was the initial clash of the war.

That the Japanese must ultimately bear the onus for the war is not in question; their record of aggression against China at least since the Twenty-one Demands in 1915, and especially since they seized Manchuria in 1931, was blatant. Yet precisely what happened at Lu-kou-ch'iao and why is still debated. The Chinese have generally contended that the Japanese purposely provoked the fighting.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 1986

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Barrett, David D. Dixie Mission: the United States Army Observer Group in Yenan, 1944. Berkeley: Center for Chinese Studies, University of California, 1970
Bisson, Thomas Arthur. Japan in China. New York: Macmillan, 1938
Boyle, John Hunter. China and Japan at war, 1937–1945: the politics of collaboration. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1972
Bunker, Gerald E. The peace conspiracy: Wang Ching-wei and the China War, 1937–1941. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1972
Butow, Robert J. C. Tojo and the coming of the war. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1961
Carlson, Evans Fordyce. The Chinese army: its organization and military efficiency. New York: Institute of Pacific Relations, 1940
Ch'en, Chen and Yao, Lo. Chung-kuo chin-tai kung-yeh shih tzu-liao (Source materials on the history of modern industry in China). 4 collections (chi) totalling 6 vols. Peking: San-lien, 1957–61
Ch'en, Po-ta Chung-kuo ssu-ta-chia-tsu. (China's four great families). Hong Kong: Chung-kuo, 1947
Ch'en, Shao-hsiao. Hei-wang-lu (Record of the black net). Hong Kong: Chih-ch'eng, 1966
Ch'en, Ta.Chung-kuo lao-kung chieh-chi yü tang-ch'ien ching-chi wei-chi’ (China's working class and the current economic crisis). She-hui chien-she, 1.4 (1 Aug. 1948)Google Scholar
Ch'en, Ta. Population in modern China. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1946
Ch'i, Hsi-sheng. Nationalist China at war: military defeats and political collapse, 1937–1945. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1982
Ch'ien, Tuan-sheng. The government and politics of China. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1950, reprinted 1961
Chang, Ch'i-yun. Tang-shih kai-yao (Survey of party history). 5 vols. Taipei: Chung-yang wen-wu, 1951
Chang, Kia-ngau. The inflationary spiral: the experience in China, 1939–1950. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1958
Chang, Ta-ch'en. ‘San-shih-san-nien ti Ch'ung-ch'ing t'u-pu-yeh’ (Chungking's handicraft textile industry in 1944). Ssu-ch'uan ching-chi chi-k'an, 2.2 (1 April 1945)Google Scholar
Chang, Wen-shih. Yun-nan nei-mu (The inside story in Yunnan). Kunming: K'un-ming kuan-ch'a, 1949
Chen, Yu-Kwei. Foreign trade and industrial development of China: an historical and integrated analysis through 1948. Washington, DC: University Press of Washington, 1956
Chennault, Claire Lee. Way of a fighter. New York: G. P. Putnam Sons, 1949
Chiang, Kai-shek Resistance and reconstruction: messages during China's six years of war, 1937–1943. New York: Harper, 1943
Chiang, Kai-shek. Chiang tsung-t'ung mi-lu. (Secret records of President Chiang). 15 vols. Taipei: Chung-yang jih-pao, 1974–8
Chin, Rockwood O. P.The Chinese cotton industry under wartime inflation’. Pacific Affairs, 16.1 (March 1943)Google Scholar
,Chinese Ministry of Information. China handbook 1937–1943: a comprehensive survey of major developments in China in six years of war, comp. New York: Macmillan, 1943.
,Chinese Ministry of Information. China handbook, 1937–1944: …in seven years… Chungking: Chinese Ministry of Information, 1944.
,Chinese Ministry of Information. China handbook, 1937–1945 (Chan-shih Chung-hua chih), new edition with 1946 supplement. New York: Macmillan, 1947.
,Chinese Ministry of Information. China handbook, 1950, comp. ,China Handbook Editorial Board. New York: Rockport Press, Inc., 1950
Chinese Press Review, comp. by ,United States Consulates. Chungking, 1942–5; Shanghai, 1946–9
Chou, Shun-hsin. The Chinese inflation, 1937–1949. New York: Columbia University Press, 1963, reprinted 1969
Chu, Tzu-chia (Chin Hsiung-pai). Wang cheng-ch'üan ti k'ai-ch'ang yü shou-ch'ang (The beginning and ending of the drama of the Wang regime). 6 vols. Hong Kong: Wu Hsing-chi shu-pao-she, 1974
Clubb, O. Edmund. Twentieth century China. New York: Columbia University Press, 1964; 3rd edn. 1978
Coble, Parks M. The Shanghai capitalists and the Nationalist government, 1927–1937. Cambridge, Mass.: Council on East Asian Studies, Harvard University, 1980
Cohen, Warren I.Who fought the Japanese in Hunan? Some views of China's war effort’. JAS 27.1 (Nov. 1967)Google Scholar
Coox, Alvin D. and Conroy, Hilary, eds. China and Japan: a search for balance since World War I. Santa Barbara: Clio Press, 1978
Crowley, James B. Japan's quest for autonomy: national security and foreign policy, 1930–1938. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1966
Deane, Hugh. ‘Political reaction in Kuomintang China’. Amerasia, 5.5 (July 1941)Google Scholar
Dorn, Frank. The Sino-Japanese War, 1937–41: from Marco Polo Bridge to Pearl Harbor. New York: Macmillan, 1974
Eastman, Lloyd E. Seeds of destruction: Nationalist China in war and revolution 1937–1949. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1984
Epstein, Israel. The unfinished revolution in China. Boston: Little, Brown, 1947
Epstein, Israel. Notes on labor problems in Nationalist China. New York: Institute of Pacific Relations, 1949
Esherick, Joseph W., ed. Lost chance in China: the World War II despatches of John S. Service. New York: Random House, 1974
Fang, Chih-p'ing et al. Lun kuan-liao tzu-pen (On bureaucratic capital). Canton: Tsung-ho, 1946
Farmer, Rhodes. Shanghai harvest: a diary of three years in the China War. London: Museum Press, 1945
Fenn, William P. The effect of the Japanese invasion on higher education in China. Kowloon: China Institute of Pacific Relations, 1940
Freyn, Hubert. Chinese education in the war. Shanghai: Kelly & Walsh, 1940
Freyn, Hubert. Free China's New Deal. New York: Macmillan, 1943
Fujiwara, Akira. ‘The role of the Japanese Army’, trans, by Okamoto, Shumpei in Borg, Dorothy and Okamoto, Shumpei, eds. Pearl Harbor as history: Japanese–American relations, 1931–1941Google Scholar
Gillin, Donald G.Problems of centralization in Republican China: the case of Ch'en Ch'eng and the Kuomintang’. JAS 29.4 (Aug. 1970)Google Scholar
Hata, Ikuhiko. Nitchū sensō shi. (History of the Japanese-Chinese war). Rev. edn, Tokyo: Kawade shobō shinsha 1971
Ho, Ping-ti. Studies on the population of China, 1368–1953. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1959
Ho, Ying-ch'in. ‘Chi-nien ch'i-ch'i k'ang-chan tsai po Chung-kung ti hsu-wei hsuan-ch'uan’ (Commemorating the Sino-Japanese War and again refuting the Communists' false propaganda). Part II. Tzu-yu chung, 3.3 (20 Sept. 1972)Google Scholar
Hsu, Fu-kuan. ‘Shih shui chi k'uei-le Chung-kuo she-hui fan-kung ti li-liang?’ (Who is it that destroys the anti-Communist power of Chinese society?) Min-chu p'ing-lun, 1.7 (16 Sept. 1949)Google Scholar
Hsu, Long-hsueh and Ming-kai, Chang, comps. History of the Sino– Japanese War, 1937–1945, trans, by Ha-hsiung, Wen. Taipei: Chung Wu Publishing Co., 1971
Hsu, Ti-hsin. ‘K'ang-chan i-lai liang-ko chieh-tuan ti Chung-kuo ching-chi’ (China's economy during the two stages of the war). Li-lun yü hsien-shih, 1.4 (15 Feb. 1940)Google Scholar
Iriye, Akira, ed. The Chinese and the Japanese: essays in political and cultural interactions. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1980
Juan, Yu-ch'iu. ‘Chin-jih hou-fang min-ying kung-yeh ti wei-chi’ (The current crisis of private industry in the rear area). Chung-kuo nung-min, 3.1/2 (June 1943)Google Scholar
Kan, K'o-ch'ao. ‘Chan-shih Ssu-ch'uan kung-yeh kai-kuan’ (Survey of Szechwan's wartime economy). Ssu-ch'uan ching-chi chi-k'an, 1.2 (15 March 1944)Google Scholar
Kataoka, Tetsuya. Resistance and revolution in China: the Communists and the second united front. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1974
Kennedy, Melville T. Jr.The Chinese Democratic League’. Harvard papers on China, 7 (1953)Google Scholar
Kirby, William Corbin. Germany and Republican China. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1984
Kuan, Meng-chueh. ‘Shan-hsi-sheng fang-chih-yeh chih wei-chi chi ch'i ch'u-lu’ (The crisis of Shensi's textile industry and its solution). Chung-kuo kung-yeh, 19 (1 Sept. 1943)Google Scholar
Kuo-min ching-shen tsung-tung-yuan yun-tung (National spiritual mobilization movement), comp. by t'uan-pu, San-min-chu-i ch'ing-nien-t'uan chung-yang. n.p. 1944
Li, I-yeh. Chung-kuo jen-min tsen-yang ta-pai Jih-pen ti-kuo-chu-i A (How the Chinese people defeated Japanese imperialism). Peking: K'ai-ming, 1951
Li, Tzu-hsiang. ‘K'ang-chan i-lai Ssu-ch'uan chih kung-yeh’ (Szechwan's industry during the war). Ssu-ch'uan ching-chi chi-k'an, 1.1 (15 Dec. 1943)Google Scholar
Li, Tzu-hsiang. ‘Wo-kuo chan-shih kung-yeh sheng-ch'an ti hui-ku yü ch'ien-chan’ (The Past and future of China's wartime industrial production). SCCC 2.3 (1 July 1945)Google Scholar
Li, Yun-han. Sung Che-yuan yü ch'i-ch'i k'ang-chan (Sung Che-yuan and the 7 July war of resistance). Taipei: Chuan-chi wen-hsueh, 1973
Lin, Chi-yung. ‘K'ang-chan ch'i-chung min-ying ch'ang-k'uang ch'ien-Ch'uan chien-shu’ (Summary account of the move of privately-owned factories and mines to Szechwan during the war). Ssu-ch'uan wen-hsien, 62 (1 Oct. 1967)Google Scholar
Liu, Chi-pingSan-shih-san-nien Ssu-ch'uan chih shang-yeh’ (The commercial economy of Szechwan in 1944). Ssu-ch'uan ching-chi chi-k'an, 2.2 (1 April 1945)Google Scholar
Liu, Min. ‘San-shih-san-nien Ssu-ch'uan chih kung-yeh’ (Szechwan's industry in 1944). SCCC 2.2 (1 April 1945)Google Scholar
Liu, F. F. A military history of modern China, 1924–1949. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1956
Lutz, Jessie Gregory. China and the Christian colleges, 1850–1950. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1971
Miles, Milton E. A different kind of war: the little-known story of the combined guerrilla forces created in China by the US Navy and the Chinese during World War II. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1967
P'an, Tsu-yung. ‘Hou-fang pan-ch'ang ti k'un-nan ho ch'i-wang’ (Difficulties and hopes of factory management in the rear area). Hsin-ching-chi, 6.11 (1 Mar. 1942)Google Scholar
Powell, Lyle Stephenson. A surgeon in wartime China. Lawrence, Kansas: University of Kansas Press, 1946
Romanus, Charles F. and Sunderland, Riley. Vol. 1. Stilwell's mission to China. Washington, DC: Office of the Chief of Military History, Dept. of the Army, 1953; vol. 2. Stilwell's command problems, same pub., 1956; vol. 3. Time runs out in CBI, same pub., 1959Google Scholar
Sa, K'ung-liao. Liang-nien ti cheng-chih-fan sheng-huo (Two years in the life of a political prisoner). Hong Kong: Ch'un-feng, 1947
Shih, Ching-han. ‘Huang-fan-ch'ü ti tsai-h'ing ho hsin-sheng’ (The disaster and rebirth of the Yellow River flood area). Kuan-ch'a, 3.3 (13 Sept. 1947)Google Scholar
Shih, Hsi-min. ‘K'ang-chan i-lai ti Chung-kuo kung-yeh’ (Chinese industry during the war). Li-lun yü hsien-shih, 1.4 (15 Feb. 1940)Google Scholar
Shih, Kuo-heng China enters the machine age: a study of labor in Chinese war industry, ed. and trans, by Fei, Hsiao-tung and Hsu., Francis L. K. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1944
Sih, Paul K. T., ed. Nationalist China during the Sino-Japanese War, 1937–1945. Hicksville, NY: Exposition Press, 1977
Snow, Edgar. The battle for Asia. New York: Random House, 1941
T'ao, Ta-yung. ‘Lun tang-ch'ien ti kung-yeh chiu-chi’ (Current means of rescuing industry). Chung-kuo kung-yeh, 25 (Mar. 1944)Google Scholar
Ting, Lee-hsia Hsu. Government control of the press in modern China, 1900–1949. Cambridge Mass.: East Asian Research Center, Harvard University, 1974
Tipton, Laurence. Chinese escapade. London: Macmillan, 1949
Tong, Hollington K. (Hsien-kuang, Tung), ed. China after seven years of war. New York: Macmillan, 1945
Tong, Hollington K. China and the world press. Nanking, Feb. 1948
Tuchman, Barbara W. Stilwell and the American experience in China, 1911–45. New York: Macmillan, 1970
Van Slyke, Lyman P. Enemies and friends: the united front in Chinese Communist history. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1967
Van Slyke, Lyman P., ed. The Chinese Communist movement: a report of the United States War Department, July 1945. Report prepared by the Military Intelligence Division. ‘Originally published in 1952…as an appendix to official transcript of the 1951 Senate hearings on the Institute of Pacific Relations.Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1968Google Scholar
Wedemeyer, Albert C. Wedemeyer reports! New York: Henry Holt, 1958
White, Theodore H. In search of history. New York: Harper and Row, 1979
Wu, Hsiang-hsiang. Ti-erh-tz'u Chung-Jih chan-cheng shih (The second Sino-Japanese War). 2 vols. Taipei: Tsung-ho yueh-k'an, 1973
Yen, Hsi-ta. ‘Ching-chi wei-chi yü kuan-liao tzu-pen’ (The economic crisis and bureaucratic capital). Ching-chi chou-pao 4.6 (6 Feb. 1947)Google Scholar
Young, Arthur N. China and the helping hand, 1937–1945. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1963
Young, Arthur N. China's wartime finance and inflation, 1937–1945. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1965
Yung, Lung-kuei. ‘Chiu-chi chan-shih kung-yeh ti chi-pen t'u-ching’ (Fundamental means of rescuing the wartime industry). Chung-kuo kung-yeh, 25 (Mar. 1944)Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×