You know about the Holocaust, and German atrocities during World War Two. You know about Mao’s Cultural Revolution and Stalin’s Gulag Archipelago. But we’ll bet you’re not so familiar with another one of the greatest atrocities to occur during the 20th Century.
As a general rule here at the Outrage we focus on the Here and Now; there’s certainly no shortage of current events to feed the fires of outrage. But the publication of Iris Chang’s book, The Rape of Nanking, has inspired us to take a look back at one of the most nauseating events in the history of Outrage.
Chang has written a well-documented book based on American missionary diaries, U.S. Naval intelligence reports, Japanese military diaries, letters and reports from Nazi party members stationed in Nanking, Japanese foreign office communications, news reports, photographs, and film footage. But the most chilling evidence is the 1,700 testimonials from Chinese survivors, many of whom are still alive.
In December of 1937 the Japanese Army swept into the eastern Chinese city of Nanking and began an orgy of rape, torture and murder which was so brutal that even the Nazis were appalled. Within weeks of the invasion more than 300,000 civilians had been butchered.
To put this atrocity into perspective consider this: in six to eight weeks, Japanese soldiers killed more Chinese civilians than the combined death toll from the U.S. atomic attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. More civilians were killed in two months in Nanking than were killed in Great Britain, France, and Belgium, combined, during all of World War Two.
But the real Outrage can not be explained simply with statistics. Japanese soldiers, acting on orders to spare no one, were probably seeking to terrify the rest of China into submission by making an example of the civilians in Nanking. Their brutality was almost beyond comprehension.
Chinese men and women were used for bayonet practice and decapitation contests. Babies were tossed into vats of boiling water. In a secret laboratory called Ei1644 Japanese scientists injected Chinese captives with poisons, germs, and lethal gasses.
Methods of killing included hanging victims by their tongues on iron hooks, and burying civilians waist deep to be torn apart by German Shepherds. Nazis in Nanking at the time called the Japanese atrocities the work of a “bestial machinery.”
As the sobriquet implies, the worst atrocities were inflicted against Chinese women. Japanese soldiers raped from 20,000 to 80,000 Chinese women during this orgy of brutality, making it the second worst mass rape in world history. (The worst supposedly being the attacks on Bengali women by Pakistani soldiers in 1971.)
In addition to gang rape, many of the victims were brutally tortured to death after being raped. Some rape victims were disemboweled, or nailed alive to walls. Others had their breasts cut off. Japanese soldiers forced some Chinese civilians to commit incest while their families and the soldiers watched. During and after the Rape of Nanking “uncounted” numbers of Chinese women committed suicide by drowning themselves in the Yangtze River.
As terrible as it was, the atrocities that took place in Nanking in late 1937 and early 1938 were only a small part of Chinese suffering. Chang estimates a staggering 19 million Chinese died as a result of the Japanese invasion during World War Two.
ih, my god. this is the most disturbing thin i have read in a long time.
Time: 1/19/98 (0:57:37)
Time: 1/17/98 (14:56:25)
Time: 1/15/98 (14:25:30)
Time: 1/15/98 (8:9:4)
Time: 1/15/98 (4:40:1)
Time: 1/14/98 (10:40:19)
HELL,IS,HOT
Something was left out of the article: the general in charge of the capitulation/occupation of Nanking had originally had orders to participate in a campaign similar to the German’s when they invaded France (Wir sind nicht Barbaren/”We are not barbarians”). The idea was to show the Chinese that the Imperial Japanese were willing to share their power in the “Greater East Asian Co-prosperity Sphere.” Unfortunately, one of the Imperial Princes was there as an observer (Prince Asaka, I believe) and countermanded the original orders and pulled rank in order to satisfy his own dark desires against the Chinese people (his wife had died shortly before his arrival in China – Hirohito was rumbered to have sent him in order to rouse him from his depressive mourning). One would have thought that he would have been executed at the end of the war for his role at the Rape of Nanking, but since Gen. MacArthur and the occupation army cut a deal to protect the Imperial family from retribution (in order to secure a bulwark against possible communist expansion in the east). So in short, they executed the General that was present at the Rape of Nanking, while Prince Asaka lived in one of his summer palaces (which conveinently was “owned” by the Fujiwara family) and played golf all day until he died peacefully of old age.
My mother used to tell me comments about how easy we have it here, and how back in China, there were always “bad conditions.” I used to not care because she simply glossed over it, but I am glad of being informed. Thanks.
What the Japanese soldiers did in Nanking is unimaginable. I feel sorry for those who are still denying the occurrence of the Massacre. It pains me to see that similar events are still taking place in many parts of the world.
THOSE BLOODY JAPANESE!!!!!!!!
I always heard that Japan regards honour very highly, BUT THEY BLOODY WELL HAVE NONE!!! Is there anyway that we can bring this up in the next U.N. and demand from Japanese that they acknowledge what they done. Email me back if there is.
I have to say, I myself have read a lot about the atrocities committed by Hitler during WWII- we are all forced to learn about them in school, anymore. But never, even in my interest in researching WWII and the Axis Powers, have I ever heard anything about the Rape of Nanking. I begin to wonder why, and then I realize- the Japanese are a major trade partner with the U.S. We don’t want to publicly say or learn anything offensive about them. It’s disgusting. Thank you, Outrage, for bringing this atrocity to my attention. There are a few people I’m going to have to talk to now. If chilcren learn about the Holocaust, should they not learn about the Rape?
this is horribe how come no one knows about it??
THIS IS HORRIBLE !!!!! THOSE BLOODY JAPANS HOW COULD THEY BE SO HORRIBLE