1.
0 Introduction
1.1 History of contact
China's contact with Japan goes back to Han dynasty times when Japan began to take on many
Chinese traditions. For example there is an overlap in the written script - the Japanese 'Kanji’
characters are derived from Chinese ('Hanzi') characters . The religions of Japan also have
similarities, Buddhism is strong in both countries and Shintoism is broadly similar to Daoism.
When Chinese regional power reached a highpoint in the Tang dynasty , Japan sent embassies to
China and adopted the Chinese Confucian administrative system , although it never became a vassal
state like Korea and Vietnam . A Buddhist scholar Jianzhen went to Japan in 754 with many
scriptures. He founded the temple Tōshōdai-ji which stands to this day. There have been occasions
where China attempted to conquer Japan. After the Mongol dynasty overwhelmed the Song dynasty
China , Kublai Khan launched an invasion of Japan in 1274. They were defeated by the violent storms
at seas as much as by staunch Japanese defense. The event was repeated in 1281 when a typhoon
drowned thousands of Mongol troops, the term ‘ Kamikaze ’ (Divine Wind) comes from this incident.
Plans for a third invasion in 1285 were abandoned probably on the basis of the crippling costs
involved. This has its echo in the attempted Spanish Armada invasion of Britain in 1588.
In the Ming dynasty 1550-1570 attacks from Japanese pirates along the south-eastern coast
caused widespread destruction, with the cities of Hangzhou and Ningbo set to the torch. When
Japan invaded Korea in 1593, China stepped in to defend Korea and repulse the Japanese attack.
1.2 Japanese Meiji Restoration
Probably the most important event in modern Japanese history came in 1868. It was forced upon
Japan by the Western powers in a similar way to the First Opium War on China in 1840. This time it
was the Americans under Commodore Perry who forced unequal treaties to be signed in 1858. For
centuries Japan had been ruled by a dynastic Emperor modelled somewhat on the China's imperial
system. The Meiji Restoration brought in constitutional monarchy rather like Britain. The emperor
was the figurehead of the country but had limited political power. This had always been more the
case in Japan than China as the same family has ruled for 1,700 years - a single continuous dynasty.
The Emperor is considered sacred and loyalty absolute but the Emperors rarely ruled by diktat, they
worked through the shoguns (military) and/or officials. The Meiji system allowed Japan to rapidly
modernize and so provided a blueprint as to how an Asian country could catch up and take on the
European powers.
1.3 Pre Sino-Japanese War Chinese-Japanese Relations
China's relationship with Japan is of utmost importance and sensitivity. China and Japan are
geographically separated only by a relatively narrow stretch of ocean. China has strongly influenced
Japan with its writing system, architecture, culture, religion, philosophy, and law. When Western
countries forced Japan to open trading in the mid-19th century, Japan moved towards
modernization (Meiji Restoration), viewing China as an antiquated civilization, unable to defend
itself against Western forces in part due to the First and Second Opium Wars along with Anglo-
French Expeditions from the 1840s to the 1860s. Japan's long chain of invasions and war crimes in
China between 1894 and 1945 as well as modern Japan's attitude towards its past are major issues
affecting current Sino-Japanese relations.
To begin with the main issues between Japan and China, especially between 1894–95, Japan was
interested in Korea due to its strategic location and valuable natural resources, such as iron and coal,
where as Korea had been China’s most important client state, and as a direct consequence of this
conflict of interests, a war grew out of conflict between the two countries for supremacy in Korea.
This marked the emergence of Japan as a major world power and demonstrated the weakness of the
Chinese empire. In 1875 Japan, which had begun to adopt Western technology, forced Korea to
open itself to foreign, especially Japanese, trade and to declare itself independent from China in its
foreign relations. Japan soon became identified with the more radical modernizing forces within the
Korean government, while China continued to sponsor the conservative officials gathered around
the royal family. In 1884 a group of pro-Japanese reformers attempted to overthrow the Korean
government, but Chinese troops under Gen. Yuan Shikai rescued the king, killing several Japanese
legation guards in the process. War was avoided between Japan and China by the signing of the Li-
Itō Convention , in which both countries agreed to withdraw troops from Korea.
In 1894, however, Japan, flushed with national pride in the wake of its successful modernization
program and its growing influence upon young Koreans, was not so ready to compromise. In that
year, Kim Ok-Kyun, the pro-Japanese Korean leader of the 1884 coup , was lured to Shanghai and
assassinated, probably by agents of Yuan Shikai. His body was then put aboard a Chinese warship
and sent back to Korea, where it was quartered and displayed as a warning to other rebels. The
Japanese government took this as a direct affront, and the Japanese public was outraged. The
situation was made more tense later in the year when the Tonghak rebellion broke out in Korea, and
the Chinese government, at the request of the Korean king, sent troops to aid in dispersing the
rebels. The Japanese considered this a violation of the Li-Itō Convention, and they sent 8,000 troops
to Korea. When the Chinese tried to reinforce their own forces, the Japanese sank the British
steamer Kowshing , which was carrying the reinforcements, further inflaming the situation.
War was finally declared on August 1, 1894. This marked the first Sino Japanese War. Although
foreign observers had predicted an easy victory for the more massive Chinese forces, the Japanese
had done a more successful job of modernizing, and they were better equipped and prepared.
Japanese troops scored quick and overwhelming victories on both land and sea. By March 1895 the
Japanese had successfully invaded Shandong province and Manchuria and had fortified posts that
commanded the sea approaches to Beijing. The Chinese sued for peace. In the Treaty of
Shimonoseki , which ended the conflict, China recognized the independence of Korea and ceded
Taiwan, the adjoining Pescadores , and the Liaodong Peninsula in Manchuria. China also agreed to
pay a large indemnity and to give Japan trading privileges on Chinese territory.
2.0 The Official Invasion of China
2.1 Background
2.1.1 Russo-Japanese War
The Russo-Japanese War (Japanese-Russian War) was fought during 1904–1905 between the Russian
Empire and the Empire of Japan over rival imperial ambitions in Manchuria and Korea. The major
theatres of operations were the Liaodong Peninsula and Mukden in Southern Manchuria and the
seas around Korea, Japan and the Yellow Sea. Russia sought a warm-water port on the Pacific Ocean
for its navy and for maritime trade. Vladivostok was operational only during the summer, whereas
Port Arthur, a naval base in Liaodong Province leased to Russia by China, was operational all year.
Since the end of the First Sino-Japanese War in 1895, Japan feared Russian encroachment on its
plans to create a sphere of influence in Korea and Manchuria. Russia had demonstrated an
expansionist policy in the Siberian Far East from the reign of Ivan the Terrible in the 16th century.
Seeing Russia as a rival, Japan offered to recognize Russian dominance in Manchuria in exchange for
recognition of Korea as being within the Japanese sphere of influence. Russia refused and demanded
Korea north of the 39th parallel to be a neutral buffer zone between Russia and Japan. The Japanese
government perceived a Russian threat to its plans for expansion into Asia and chose to go to war.
After negotiations broke down in 1904, the Japanese Navy opened hostilities by attacking the
Russian Eastern Fleet at Port Arthur, China, in a surprise attack. Russia suffered multiple defeats by
Japan, but Tsar Nicholas II was convinced that Russia would win and chose to remain engaged in the
war; at first, to await the outcomes of certain naval battles, and later to preserve the dignity of
Russia by averting a "humiliating peace". Russia ignored Japan's willingness early on to agree to an
armistice and rejected the idea to bring the dispute to the Arbitration Court at The Hague. The war
concluded with the Treaty of Portsmouth , mediated by US President Theodore Roosevelt. The
complete victory of the Japanese military surprised world observers. The consequences transformed
the balance of power in East Asia, resulting in a reassessment of Japan's recent entry onto the world
stage. It was the first major military victory in the modern era of an Asian power over a European
one. Scholars continue to debate the historical significance of the war.
2.2 The Mukden Incident
Japanese economic presence and political interest in Manchuria had been growing ever since the
end of the Russo-Japanese War (1904–1905). The Treaty of Portsmouth that ended the war had
granted Japan the lease of the South Manchuria Railway branch (from Changchun to Lüshun ) of the
China Far East Railway . The Japanese government, however, claimed that this control included all
the rights and privileges that China granted to Russia in the 1896 Li–Lobanov Treaty, as enlarged by
the Kwantung Lease Agreement of 1898. This included absolute and exclusive administration within
the South Manchuria Railway Zone . Japanese railway guards were stationed within the zone to
provide security for the trains and tracks; however, these were regular Japanese soldiers , and they
frequently carried out manoeuvres outside the railway areas. There were many reports of raids on
local Chinese villages by bored Japanese soldiers, and all complaints from the Chinese government
were ignored.
Manchurian Incident or Mukden Incident, 1931, a confrontation that gave Japan the impetus to set
up a puppet government in Manchuria. After the Russo-Japanese War (1904–5), Japan replaced
Russia as the dominant foreign power in S Manchuria. By the late 1920s the Japanese feared that
unification of China under the Kuomintang party would imperil Japanese interests in Manchuria. This
view was confirmed when the Manchurian general Chang Hsüeh-liang , a recent convert to the
Kuomintang, refused to halt construction of railway and harbour facilities in competition with the
South Manchurian Railway , referring Japan to the Nationalist central government. Believing that a
conflict in Manchuria would be in the best interests of Japan, and acting in the spirit of the Japanese
concept of gekokujō, Kwantung Army Colonel Seishirō Itagaki and Lieutenant Colonel Kanji Ishiwara
independently devised a plan to prompt Japan to invade Manchuria by provoking an incident from
Chinese forces stationed nearby. However, after the Japanese Minister of War Jirō Minami
dispatched Major General Yoshitsugu Tatekawa to Manchuria for the specific purpose of curbing the
insubordination and militarist behavior of the Kwantung Army, Itagaki and Ishiwara knew that they
no longer had the luxury of waiting for the Chinese to respond to provocations, but had to stage
their own.
Itagaki and Ishiwara chose to sabotage the rail section in an area near Liutiao Lake. The area had no
official name and was not militarily important, but it was only eight hundred metres away from the
Chinese garrison of Beidaying, near Shenyang (then known as Mukden) where troops under the
command of the "Young Marshal" Zhang Xueliang were stationed. The Japanese plan was to attract
Chinese troops by an explosion and then blame them for having caused the disturbance in order to
provide a pretext for a formal Japanese invasion. In addition, they intended to make the sabotage
appear more convincing as a calculated Chinese attack on an essential target, thereby making the
expected Japanese reaction appear as a legitimate measure to protect a vital railway of industrial
and economic importance. The Japanese press labelled the site "Liǔtiáo Ditch" or "Liǔtiáo Bridge",
when in reality, the site was a small railway section laid on an area of flat land. The choice to place
the explosives at this site was to preclude the extensive rebuilding that would have been
necessitated had the site actually been a railway bridge. The plan was executed when 1st Lieutenant
Suemori Komoto of the Independent Garrison Unit of the 29th Infantry Regiment, which guarded the
South Manchuria Railway, placed explosives near the tracks, but far enough away to do no real
damage. At around 10:20 pm, 18 September, the explosives were detonated. However, the
explosion was minor and only a 1.5-meter section on one side of the rail was damaged. In fact, a
train from Changchun passed by the site on this damaged track without difficulty and arrived at
Shenyang (Mukden) at 10:30 pm.
2.3 Invasion of Manchuria
The invasion of Manchuria was a conflict fought between China and Japan in the province
of Manchuria in north-east China. It lasted from 1931until 1932 and was a key event in the origins
of World War II in Asia. On the morning of 19 September, two artillery pieces installed at the
Mukden officers' club opened fire on the Chinese garrison nearby, in response to the alleged Chinese
attack on the railway. Zhang Xueliang's small air force was destroyed, and his soldiers fled their
destroyed Beidaying barracks, as five hundred Japanese troops attacked the Chinese garrison of
around seven thousand. The Chinese troops were no match for the experienced Japanese troops. By
the evening, the fighting was over, and the Japanese had occupied Mukden at the cost of five
hundred Chinese lives and only two Japanese lives. At Dalian in the Kwantung Leased Territory ,
Commander-in-Chief of the Kwantung Army General Shigeru Honjō was at first appalled that the
invasion plan was enacted without his permission, but he was eventually convinced by Ishiwara to
give his approval after the fact. Honjō moved the Kwantung Army headquarters to Mukden and
ordered General Senjuro Hayashi of the Chosen Army of Japan in Korea to send in reinforcements. At
04:00 on 19 September, Mukden was declared secure.
Zhang Xueliang personally ordered his men not to put up a fight and to store away any weapons
when the Japanese invaded. Therefore, the Japanese soldiers proceeded to occupy and garrison the
major cities of Changchun and Antung and their surrounding areas with minimal difficulty. However,
in November, General Ma Zhanshan, the acting governor of Heilongjiang, began resistance with his
provincial army, followed in January by Generals Ting Chao and Li Du with their local Jilin provincial
forces. Despite this resistance, within five months of the Mukden Incident, the Imperial Japanese
Army had overrun all major towns and cities in the provinces of Liaoning, Jilin, and Heilongjiang.
The Kwantung Army subjugated the peasant population of Manchuria and set them to work
constructing the Zhong Ma fortress. Atrocities were committed to deter the peasants from
attempting to escape and any who tried were immediately shot. Manchuria became a testing ground
for experiments in biological warfare headed by the young Japanese military scientist Ishii Shiro.
Using the peasants as test subjects, taking blood samples, dissecting people, and deliberately
infecting them with bubonic plague, the Japanese sought to learn more about the human body and
how they may weaponise germs.
2.4 Second Sino Japanese War
2.4.1 What triggered the war?
The causes of both the first and second Sino Japanese War were simple, yet complex to
understand. The war started basically because of territory and resource. Japan had a small territory,
and as a result, had little resources. However, Japan’s military and civilian economy was expanding.
The need for more land led to the first Sino Japanese war, as Japan targeted Korea. Japan wants to
annex Korea for her own, while China (Qing Dynasty) had already pledged to be the protector of
Korea.
The Marco Polo Bridge Incident is usually considered to have been the casus belli, i.e. start of the
Second Sino–Japanese War. It is no mistake that this incident served as the trigger for the Sino–
Japanese conflict, but the incident itself was only a small conflict and it should not be called the start
of a full-blown war. What must officially be considered to have been the start of the Second Sino–
Japanese War was the concerted full-scale attack that was the general mobilization on Aug. 13,
1937, of 30,000 regulars under the Chiang Kai-shek government in Shanghai in opposition to the
Japanese navy landing force stationed there for the protection of Japanese residents.
The Japanese invasion of China was justified by the so-called Marco Polo Bridge Incident on July 7,
1937, when Japan seized Beijing after Chinese nationalist troops under Chiang Kai-shek opened fire
on some Japanese troops who had illegally taken over a railway station. Chinese general Fang
Zhenwu, "the man who shot the first bullet against the Japanese," is regarded today as a great
Chinese hero. The skirmish between Japanese Imperial Army forces and China's Nationalist Army
along a rail line southwest of Beijing, is considered the official start of the full-scale conflict, which is
known in China as the War of Resistance Against Japan. although Japan invaded Manchuria six years
earlier. The Marco Polo Bridge incident is also known in Chinese as the “77 incident” for its date on
the seventh day of the seventh month of the year.
Marco Polo Bridge Incident gave the Japanese forces the justification they needed to launch a full-
scale invasion of China. A Japanese regiment was conducting a night manoeuvre exercise in the
Chinese city of Tientsin, shots were fired, and a Japanese soldier was allegedly killed.
The first phase of the Chinese occupation began when Japan invaded Manchuria in 1931. The second
phase began in 1937 when the Japanese launched major attacks on Beijing, Shanghai and Nanking.
The Chinese resistance stiffened after July 7, 1937, when a clash occurred between Chinese and
Japanese troops outside Beijing (then renamed Beiping) near the Marco Polo Bridge. This skirmish
not only marked the beginning of open, though undeclared, war between China and Japan but also
hastened the formal announcement of the second Kuomintang-CCP united front against Japan. By
the time the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941 they were firmly entrenched in China,
occupying much of the eastern part of the country.
The Second Sino-Japanese War lasted from 1937 to 1945 and was preceded by a series of incidents
between the Japan and China. The Mukden Incident of September 1931—in which Japanese railroad
tracks in Manchuria were allegedly bombed by Japanese nationalists in order to hasten war with
China—marked the formation of Manchukuo, a puppet state that fell under Japanese administrative
control. Chinese authorities appealed to the League of Nations (a precursor to the United Nations)
for assistance, but did not receive a response for more than a year. When the League of Nations did
eventually challenge Japan over the invasion, the Japanese simply left the League and continued
with its war effort in China.
2.4.2 Early Japanese Advances in the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945)
The Japanese easily defeated the Chinese Nationalist Army in Shanghai. Describing the Battle for
Shanghai, the Washington Post reported: “Fresh regiments of veteran Japanese regular army troops
smashed China's defence line on the northern edge of the Yangtzepoo area of the International
Settlement...Nipponese infantrymen fought with their bayonet behind a curtain of artillery shells
and aerial bombs. There were continuous explosions of large-caliber artillery shells as Chinese and
Japanese batteries engaged in a deafening duel”.
After the invasion of Shanghai Japanese troops conquered city after city. In November 1937,
Shanghai was captured; the infamous Rape of Nanking took place in December 1937; and Canton
was captured in 1938. Beijing, Tsinan and Wuhan also fell. The U.S. gunship Panay and three
Standard Oil tankers were sunk by Japanese bombs on the Yangtze River.
The Second Sino-Japanese War (1937-45) ensued, and relations with the United States, Britain,
and the Soviet Union deteriorated. The increased military activities in China--and the Japanese idea
of establishing "Mengukuo" in Inner Mongolia and the Mongolian People's Republic--soon led to a
major clash over rival Mongolia-Manchukuo border claims. When Japanese troops invaded eastern
Mongolia, a ground and air battle with a joint Soviet- Mongolian army took place between May and
September 1939 at the Battle of Halhin Gol. The Japanese were severely defeated, sustaining as
many as 80,000 casualties. Japanese troops were slaughtered in a Mongolian Desert called
Nomonhan by Soviet tanks because the military leaders though they were assured of victory because
they had been given a blessing by the Emperor. After that Japan concentrated its war efforts on its
southward drive in China and Southeast Asia, a strategy that helped propel Japan ever closer to war
with the United States and Britain and their allies.
On December 7, 1941, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, and the following day the United
States declared war on Japan. The United States began to aid China by airlifting material over the
Himalayas after the Allied defeat in Burma that closed the Burma Road . In 1944 Japan launched the
invasion, Operation Ichi-Go , that conquered Henan and Changsha . However, this failed to bring
about the surrender of Chinese forces. In 1945, the Chinese Expeditionary Force resumed its
advance in Burma and completed the Ledo Road linking India to China. At the same time, China
launched large counteroffensives in South China and retook West Hunan and Guangxi .
Despite continuing to occupy part of China's territory, Japan eventually surrendered on
September 2, 1945 , to Allied forces following the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and
the Soviet invasion of Japanese-held Manchuria. The remaining Japanese occupation forces
(excluding Manchuria) formally surrendered on September 9, 1945, with the following International
Military Tribunal for the Far East convened on April 29, 1946. At the outcome of the Cairo
Conference of November 22–26, 1943, the Allies of World War II decided to restrain and punish the
aggression of Japan by restoring all the territories that Japan annexed from China, including
Manchuria, Taiwan/ Formosa, and the Pescadores , to China, and to expel Japan from the Korean
Peninsula. China was recognized as one of the Big Four of the Allies during the war and became one
of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council.
The Second Sino-Japanese War , (1937–1945), a conflict that broke out when China began a full-
scale resistance to the expansion of Japanese influence in its territory (which had begun in 1931).
The war, which remained undeclared until December 9, 1941, may be divided into three phases: a
period of rapid Japanese advance until the end of 1938, a period of virtual stalemate until 1944, and
the final period when Allied counterattacks, principally in the Pacific and on Japan’s home islands,
brought about Japan’s surrender.
3.0 Implications
3.1 General Casualties
The Japanese invasion of China from 1937 to 1945 is one of the most important conflicts of the
20th century between the current world’s second and third largest economies and it can be said that
this had a great impact on Asia and Asian economies. The Japanese invasion of China from 1937 to
1945 was an important part of the Pacific Front of the Second World War, but lasted longer than the
Second World War (1939-1945). It was also a very cruel war, with China suffering an estimated total
of 35 million military and non-military casualties (both dead and wounded) and an estimated total of
US$383 billion property losses. The war brought to Chinese society a universality of suffering. At its
end so many people had been killed or deeply injured – soldiers, their families, the victims of
bombing and of scorched earth actions, the survivors of the economic chaos, the forced labourers,
the comfort women, the orphans – that much of the whole society was suffused with loss. There
were bitter recriminations against the few who had not suffered, or were in better material
circumstances – because their `happy’ situation was a by-product of their accommodation with the
occupiers or of profiteering.
3.2 Post war Interrelationship
The heavy losses China suffered during the war, and more importantly, the apparent lack of sincere
remorse for war crimes on the Japanese side have made this war a major obstacle to improving
bilateral relations between the two peoples and their respective governments. Basically, the war had
implications for both countries in different aspects especially on trade, investment and in particular
foreign investment.
Even though six decades have passed since the Japanese invasion of China came to an end, there
remains great antagonism among the Chinese people toward the Japanese invasion as reacted in
both traditional and modern media, such as movies and internet forums. According to a Pew Global
Attitudes Project report released in September 2006, roughly seven in ten Chinese people dislike
Japan. Much of the antipathy among Chinese people toward Japan is rooted in the long memory of
the Japanese invasion of the 1930s and 1940s. Eighty one percent of the Chinese surveyed believed
Japan had not apologized adequately for the war atrocities it committed against the Chinese people
during the 1930s and 1940s.
At the end of the war Chinese society was riddled by mistrust. The natural trust between
individuals and groups that had been the glue of traditional society was gone, broken by the war,
eroded, undermined, and betrayed in a myriad of ways. The old social elites had either disappeared
from the occupied areas or had lived with the Japanese in various degrees of accommodation. In the
unoccupied areas, social trust had been undermined by separation, deprivation and loss of morale.
The loss of trust was epitomised by the growth of official spying, whether the Japanese secret police,
or the GMD’s and CCP’s spy systems. The optimistic, positive atmosphere of the early 1930s seemed
to be lost forever. The atmosphere of mistrust was intensified under the early CCP, in a welter of
political movements that demanded victims and forced people to distrust each other – while making
it easier for people to attack those with whom they no longer felt personal connections. The
excesses of the Mao Era had their beginnings in the Resistance War.
The war destroyed much of the cohesion of Chinese society. This cohesion was already under threat
in the early years of the Republic, as the old order weakened under the assault of militarism, political
change and modernity. The war accelerated the process dramatically. The family declined in size.
Functions that families performed for their members fell in to disuse – communal housing, the
provision of financial support, and aid in times of need. Periodic tasks of ritual significance could not
be performed during the war: the choice of spouses for children by their parents, the naming of
children, the proper burial of the dead. Family celebrations of the New Year, or the sweeping of the
graves were often impossible in wartime; the expense, the absence of key members and the
impropriety of enjoyment in war made it difficult to hold celebrations that solidified families and
communities.
The Military conflict between China and Japan has been recurrent since as early as the first
millennium. Modernly speaking, it is the 1930s and 1940s, comprising the second Sino-Japanese War
and World War II, which represent the most significant instance of combat between the two nations.
This historical period carries far-reaching implications for the current Sino-Japanese relationship.
China still harbors bitterness towards Japan for its actions during this period, which include the
latter’s 1931 incursion into the former’s Manchuria province, its brutal rape of Nanking and
subsequent full-scale invasion in 1937, followed by continued conflict between the two during the
Second World War. As Foreign Affairs relates: “Although World War II is more than half a century in
the past and Japanese expansionism in Asia dates back another half century still, this history
continues to haunt relations between Japan and China. The War of Resistance Against Japan, as the
Chinese call their version of World War II, lasted more than twice as long as Japan’s conflict with the
United States; it had already been raging for more than four years when Japan attacked Pearl
Harbor. By the time the war ended, it had caused far more casualties and atrocities than had the
bitter struggle between Japan and the United States.”
Much of the current animosity that China harbors towards Japan is firmly planted in this past-history
paradigm.
As for Japan, defeat in a war commonly makes an identity change necessary. Since it was unable to
defeat the enemy the country was obviously not as great as its citizens may have believed. This was
the case for Japan after its defeat in 1945 and this arguably explains the centrality of the post-war
period to Japanese identity. Since 1995, Japanese apologies and statements have made increasingly
clear references to the post-war period. The need to emphasise that Japan has been peaceful
throughout the post-war period would not have been there had it not been for Japan's history as an
aggressor. This becomes quite clear in Japanese apologies, which contrast post-war Japan with the
wartime ‘other’ as they depict the past as a foreign country. They present the Japanese story of its
peaceful post-war and requests recognition for this self-identity. On the other hand, Japan has
grown to become a solid nation standing on its own two feet. The politics have had slight turmoil
over the years as younger generations have moved into power and forced politics and society to
change. When it comes to the military, Japan has focused less on military might than on economics
and politics. While it has a military presence, it has focused that on defence rather than offense.
Economically, Japan has skyrocketed since the end of World War II and the rebuilding of the
nation by the West. Through alliances, three in post-war history, Japan has moved to a super
economic and political power. It began in 1902 with Great Britain, 1943 with the Axis powers, and in
1951 with the US. Though these did not last, they were instrumental in creating the Japan of today.
Culturally, Japan is moving forward into the twenty-first century as it sees the advantages of joining
the West and grasping resources it can use to improve the nation.
3.3 Tension
Even before World War II, there was tension between Japan and China. After the war, that
tension only accelerated. First, there was the trouble regarding Japanese occupation of China as in
the Nanking Massacre. With that in the past, Japan and China found themselves on opposite sides of
the Cold War. China aligned itself with the communist Soviet Union while Japan aligned itself with
the capitalist United States. That enhanced the rivalry.
3.4 Interaction and Progress
As Asia pulled out of the Cold War, Japan and China began to interact more. Though things
improved on the surface, the underlying fear was still present. Japan surged forward as an economic
leader in Asia. China in the last few decades has begun to challenge that standing. After WWII, Japan
took a very pacifist stance regarding war and military. China has continually sought to grow the
military which has, in turn, caused Japan to keep a wary eye on the country due to its size and
determination to modernize the military.
Conclusively, while it appears that China is moving forward to a position where both Japan and
China will be able to bury the hatchet in the past, the undercurrents are still too tense to see an easy
less confrontational relationship in the past between the two nations. For one, Japan is refusing to
fully acknowledge its role in past conflicts such as the Nanking Massacre. China has yet to fully
embrace a Western process. It still has too much of the communist blood running in its political
veins. Until these issues can be resolved, neither nation will be able to forge a bond that would
strengthen Asia as a whole.
