Battle of Nanking
The Battle of Nanking (or Nanjing) was fought in early December 1937 during the Second Sino-Japanese War between the Chinese National Revolutionary Army and the Imperial Japanese Army for control of Nanjing (Nanking), the capital of the Republic of China.
This article is about the 1937 battle. For other battles, see Battle of Nanjing (disambiguation).Battle of Nanking
南京保衛戰
南京保卫战
Battle to Defend Nanjing
Nánjīng Bǎowèi Zhàn
Nánjīng Bǎowèi Zhàn
Nan2-ching1 Pao3-wei4 Chan4
南京戦
なんきんせん
Nankin-sen
Nankin-sen
Following the outbreak of war between Japan and China in July 1937, the Japanese government at first attempted to contain the fighting and sought a negotiated settlement to the war. However, after victory in the Battle of Shanghai expansionists prevailed within the Japanese military and on December 1 a campaign to capture Nanjing was officially authorized. The task of occupying Nanjing was given to General Iwane Matsui, the commander of Japan's Central China Area Army, who believed that the capture of Nanjing would force China to surrender and thus end the war. Chinese leader Chiang Kai-shek ultimately decided to defend the city and appointed Tang Shengzhi to command the Nanjing Garrison Force, a hastily assembled army of local conscripts and the remnants of the Chinese units who had fought in Shanghai.
Japanese soldiers marched from Shanghai to Nanjing at a breakneck pace, rapidly defeating pockets of Chinese resistance. By December 9 they had reached the last line of defense, the Fukuo Line, behind which lay Nanjing's fortified walls. On December 10 Matsui ordered an all-out attack on Nanjing, and after less than two days of intense fighting Chiang decided to abandon the city. Before fleeing, Tang ordered his men to launch a concerted breakout of the Japanese siege, but by this time Nanjing was largely surrounded and its defenses were at the breaking point. Most of Tang's units simply collapsed, their soldiers often casting off their weapons and uniforms in the streets in the hopes of hiding among the city's civilian population.
Following the capture of the city Japanese soldiers massacred Chinese prisoners of war, murdered civilians, and committed acts of looting, torture, and rape in an event known as the Nanjing Massacre. Though Japan's military victory excited and emboldened them, the subsequent massacre tarnished their reputation in the eyes of the world. Contrary to Matsui's expectations, China did not surrender and the Second Sino-Japanese War continued for another eight years.
Prelude to the battle[edit]
Japan's decision to capture Nanjing[edit]
The conflict which would become known as the Second Sino-Japanese War started on July 7, 1937, with a skirmish at Marco Polo Bridge which escalated rapidly into a full-scale war in northern China between the armies of China and Japan.[8] China, however, wanted to avoid a decisive confrontation in the north and so instead opened a second front by attacking Japanese units in Shanghai in central China.[8] The Japanese responded by dispatching the Shanghai Expeditionary Army (SEA), commanded by General Iwane Matsui, to drive the Chinese Army from Shanghai.[9] Intense fighting in Shanghai forced Japan's Army General Staff, which was in charge of military operations, to repeatedly reinforce the SEA, and finally on November 9 an entirely new army, the 10th Army commanded by Lieutenant General Heisuke Yanagawa, was also landed at Hangzhou Bay just south of Shanghai.[9]
Although the arrival of the 10th Army succeeded at forcing the Chinese Army to retreat from Shanghai, the Japanese Army General Staff had decided to adopt a policy of non-expansion of hostilities with the aim of ending the war.[10] On November 7 its de facto leader Deputy Chief of Staff Hayao Tada laid down an "operation restriction line" preventing its forces from leaving the vicinity of Shanghai, or more specifically from going west of the Chinese cities of Suzhou and Jiaxing.[11] The city of Nanjing is 300 kilometers (190 miles) west of Shanghai.[11]
Road to Nanjing[edit]
China's defense preparations[edit]
Following the Manchurian Incident of 1931, the Chinese government began a fast track national defense program with massive construction of primary and auxiliary air force bases around the capital of Nanjing including Jurong Airbase, completed in 1934, from which to facilitate aerial defense as well as launching counter-strikes against enemy incursions; on August 15, 1937, the IJN launched the first of many heavy schnellbomber (fast bomber) raids against Jurong Airbase using the advanced G3Ms based upon Giulio Douhet's blitz-attack concept in an attempt to neutralize the Chinese Air Force fighters guarding the capital city, but was severely repulsed by the unexpected heavy resistance and performance of the Chinese fighter pilots stationed at Jurong, and suffering almost 50% loss rate.[24][25]
On November 20 the Chinese Army and teams of conscripted laborers began to hurriedly bolster Nanjing's defenses both inside and outside the city.[23][26] Nanjing itself was surrounded by formidable stone walls stretching almost fifty kilometers (31 miles) around the entire city.[27] The walls, which had been constructed hundreds of years earlier during the Ming Dynasty, rose up to twenty meters (66 feet) in height, were nine meters (30 feet) thick, and had been studded with machine gun emplacements.[28] By December 6 all the gates into the city had been closed and then barricaded with an additional layer of sandbags and concrete six meters (20 feet) thick.[29][30]
Outside the walls a series of semicircular defense lines were constructed in the path of the Japanese advance, most notably an outer one about sixteen kilometers (9.9 miles) from the city and an inner one directly outside the city known as the Fukuo Line, or multiple positions line.[31][32][33] The Fukuo Line, a sprawling network of trenches, moats, barbed wire, mine fields, gun emplacements, and pillboxes, was to be the final defense line outside Nanjing's city walls. There were also two key high points of land on the Fukuo Line, the peaks of Zijinshan to the northeast and the plateau of Yuhuatai to the south, where fortification was especially dense.[23][34][35] In order to deny the Japanese invaders any shelter or supplies in this area, Tang adopted a strategy of scorched earth on December 7, ordering all homes and structures in the path of the Japanese within one to two kilometers (1.2 miles) of the city to be incinerated, as well as all homes and structures near roadways within sixteen kilometers (9.9 miles) of the city.[23]
The defending army, the Nanjing Garrison Force, was on paper a formidable army of thirteen divisions, including three elite German-trained divisions plus the super-elite Training Brigade, but in reality most of these units had trickled back to Nanjing severely mauled from the fighting in Shanghai.[36][37] By the time they reached Nanjing they were physically exhausted, low on equipment, and badly depleted in total troop strength. In order to replenish some of these units, 16,000 young men and teenagers from Nanjing and the rural villages surrounding it were speedily pressed into service as new recruits.[23][38] An additional 14,000 fresh soldiers were brought in from Hankou to fill the ranks of the 2nd Army.[39] However, due to the unexpected rapidity of the Japanese advance, most of the new conscripts received only rudimentary training on how to fire their guns on their way to or upon their arrival at the frontlines.[23][37] No definitive statistics exist on how many soldiers the Nanjing Garrison Force had managed to cobble together by the time of the battle, but among leading estimates are those of David Askew who says 73,790 to 81,500,[40] those of Ikuhiko Hata who estimates 100,000,[3] and those of Tokushi Kasahara who argues in favor of about 150,000.[23]