Back Tweede Chinees-Japannese Oorlog Afrikaans الحرب اليابانية الصينية الثانية Arabic Segunda guerra sino-xaponesa AST İkinci Çin–Yaponiya müharibəsi Azerbaijani چین-ژاپون ساواشی (۱۹۳۷—۱۹۴۵) AZB Другая япона-кітайская вайна (1937—1945) Byelorussian Втора китайско-японска война Bulgarian দ্বিতীয় চীন-জাপান যুদ্ধ Bengali/Bangla Brezel Sina ha Japan (1937-1945) Breton Drugi japansko-kineski rat BS

Second Sino-Japanese War

Second Sino-Japanese War
Part of the interwar period and the Pacific theatre of World War II
Clockwise from top left:
Date7 July 1937 – 2 September 1945
Location
Result Chinese victory
Territorial
changes		 China recovers all territories lost to Japan since the Treaty of Shimonoseki
Belligerents

Nationalist government China

 Japan

Commanders and leaders
Strength

14,000,000 total

  • Chinese Nationalists: (including regional warlords):
    • 1,700,000 (1937)
    • 2,600,000 (1939)[1]
    • 5,700,000 (1945)[2]
  • Chinese Communists:
    • 640,000 (1937)[3]
    • 166,700 (1938)[4]
    • 488,744 (1940)[5]
    • 1,200,000 (1945)[6]

4,100,000 total[7]

[12]: 314 
Casualties and losses
  • Chinese Nationalists:
    • Official ROC data:
      • 1,319,958 killed
      • 1,761,335 wounded
      • 130,116 missing
      • Total: 3,211,409[13][14]
    • Other estimates:
      • 3,000,000–4,000,000+ military dead and missing
      • 500,000 captured[15][16]
  • Total: 3,211,000–10,000,000+ military casualties[16][17]
  • Chinese Communists:
    • Official PRC data:
      • 160,603 military dead
      • 290,467 wounded
      • 87,208 missing
      • 45,989 POWs
      • Total: 584,267 military casualties[18]
    • Other estimates:
  • Total:
    • 3,800,000–10,600,000+ military casualties after July 1937 (excluding Manchuria and Burma campaign)
    • 1,000,000+ captured[15][16]
    • 266,800–1,000,000 POWs dead[15][16]
  • Japanese:
    • Japanese medical data:
      • 455,700[19]–700,000 military dead[20][a]
      • 1,934,820 wounded and missing[21]
      • 22,293+ captured[b]
      • Total: 2,500,000+ military casualties (1937 to 1945 excluding Manchuria and Burma campaign)
  • Puppet states and collaborators:
    • 288,140–574,560 dead
    • 742,000 wounded
    • Middle estimate: 960,000 dead and wounded[22][17]
  • Total:
  • c. 3,000,000–3,600,000 military casualties after July 1937 (excluding Manchuria and Burma campaign)[c]
Total casualties:
15,000,000[23]–22,000,000[14]
  1. ^ This number does not include Japanese killed by Chinese forces in the Burma campaign and does not include Japanese killed in Manchuria.
  2. ^ Excluding more than 1 million who were disarmed following the surrender of Japan
  3. ^ Including casualties of Japanese puppet forces. The combined toll is most likely around 3,500,000: 2.5 million Japanese, per their own records, and 1,000,000 collaborators.
Second Sino-Japanese War
Chinese name
Traditional Chinese抗日戰爭
Simplified Chinese抗日战争
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu Pinyinkàng rì zhàn zhēng
Bopomofoㄎㄤˋ ㄖˋ ㄓㄢˋ ㄓㄥ
Alternative name
Traditional Chinese抗戰
Simplified Chinese抗战
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu Pinyinkàng zhàn
Second alternative Chinese name
Traditional Chinese八年抗戰
Simplified Chinese八年抗战
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu Pinyinbā nián kàng zhàn
Third alternative Chinese name
Traditional Chinese十四年抗戰
Simplified Chinese十四年抗战
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu Pinyinshí sì nián kàng zhàn
Fourth alternative Chinese name
Traditional Chinese第二次中日戰爭
Simplified Chinese第二次中日战争
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu Pinyindì èr cì zhōng rì zhàn zhēng
Fifth alternative Chinese name
Traditional Chinese(日本)侵華戰爭
Simplified Chinese(日本)侵华战争
Transcriptions
Japanese name
Kanji
  • 支那事変
  • 日支戦争
  • 日中戦争
Hiragana
  • しなじへん
  • にっしせんそう
  • にっちゅうせんそう
Katakana
  • シナジヘン
  • ニッシセンソウ
  • ニッチュウセンソウ
Transcriptions
Romanization
  • Shina jihen
  • Nisshi sensō
  • Nicchū sensō
Kunrei-shiki
  • Sina zihen
  • Nissi sensou
  • Nittyuu sensou

The Second Sino-Japanese War was fought between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan between 1937 and 1945, following a period of war localized to Manchuria that started in 1931.[24][25] It is considered part of World War II, and often regarded as the beginning of World War II in Asia. It was the largest Asian war in the 20th century[26] and has been described as "the Asian Holocaust", in reference to the scale of Japanese war crimes against Chinese civilians.[27][28][29] It is known in China as the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression (simplified Chinese: 抗日战争; traditional Chinese: 抗日戰爭).

On 18 September 1931, the Japanese staged the Mukden incident, a false flag event fabricated to justify their invasion of Manchuria and establishment of the puppet state of Manchukuo. This is sometimes marked as the beginning of the war.[30][31] From 1931 to 1937, China and Japan engaged in skirmishes, including in Shanghai and in Northern China. Chinese Nationalist and Communist forces, respectively led by Chiang Kai-shek and Mao Zedong, had fought each other in the Chinese Civil War since 1927. In late 1933, Chiang Kai-shek encircled the Chinese Communists in an attempt to finally destroy them, forcing the Communists into the Long March, resulting in the Communists losing around 90% of their men. As a Japanese invasion became imminent, Chiang still refused to form a united front before he was placed under house arrest by his subordinates who forced him to form the Second United Front in late 1936 in order to resist the Japanese invasion together.

The full-scale war began on 7 July 1937 with the Marco Polo Bridge incident near Beijing, which prompted a full-scale Japanese invasion of the rest of China. The Japanese captured the capital of Nanjing in 1937 and perpetrated the Nanjing Massacre. After failing to stop the Japanese capture of Wuhan in 1938, then China's de facto capital at the time, the Nationalist government relocated to Chongqing in the Chinese interior. After the Sino-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact, Soviet aid bolstered the National Revolutionary Army and Air Force. By 1939, after Chinese victories at Changsha and Guangxi, and with Japan's lines of communications stretched deep into the interior, the war reached a stalemate. The Japanese were unable to defeat Chinese Communist Party forces in Shaanxi, who waged a campaign of sabotage and guerrilla warfare. In November 1939, Chinese nationalist forces launched a large scale winter offensive, and in August 1940, communist forces launched the Hundred Regiments Offensive in central China.

In December 1941, Japan launched a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor and declared war on the United States. The US increased its aid to China under the Lend-Lease Act, becoming its main financial and military supporter. With Burma cut off, the United States Army Air Forces airlifted material over the Himalayas. In 1944, Japan launched Operation Ichi-Go, the invasion of Henan and Changsha. In 1945, the Chinese Expeditionary Force resumed its advance in Burma and completed the Ledo Road linking India to China. China launched large counteroffensives in South China and repulsed a failed Japanese invasion of West Hunan and recaptured Japanese occupied regions of Guangxi.

Japan formally surrendered on 2 September 1945, following the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Soviet declaration of war and subsequent invasions of Manchukuo and Korea. The war resulted in the deaths of around 20 million people, mostly Chinese civilians. China was recognized as one of the Big Four Allies, regained all territories lost, and became one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council.[32][33] The Chinese Civil War resumed in 1946, ending with a communist victory and the Proclamation of the People's Republic of China in 1949.

  1. ^ Hsiung, China's Bitter Victory, p. 171
  2. ^ David Murray Horner (24 July 2003). The Second World War: The Pacific. Taylor & Francis. pp. 14–15. ISBN 978-0-415-96845-4. Archived from the original on 12 October 2022. Retrieved 6 March 2011.
  3. ^ Hsiung (1992). China's Bitter Victory. Routledge. p. 79. ISBN 978-1-563-24246-5.
  4. ^ 八路军·表册 (in Chinese). 中国人民解放军历史资料丛书编审委员会. 1994. pp. 第3页. ISBN 978-7-506-52290-8.
  5. ^ 丁星, 《新四军初期的四个支队—新四军组织沿革简介(2)》【J】, 铁军, 2007年第2期, 38–40页
  6. ^ Hsiung, James C. (1992). China's Bitter Victory: The War With Japan, 1937–1945. New York: M. E. Sharpe publishing. ISBN 1-56324-246-X. Archived from the original on 12 October 2022. Retrieved 5 October 2015.
  7. ^ Hsu, p. 535.
  8. ^ Black, Jeremy (2012). Avoiding Armageddon: From the Great Wall to the Fall of France, 1918–40. A&C Black. p. 171. ISBN 978-1-441-12387-9.
  9. ^ RKKA General Staff, 1939 Archived 25 April 2016 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 17 April 2016
  10. ^ Ministry of Health and Welfare, 1964 Archived 11 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine Retrieved 11 March 2016
  11. ^ Jowett, p. 72.
  12. ^ Liu, Tinghua 刘庭华 (1995). 中国抗日战争与第二次世界大战系年要录·统计荟萃 1931–1945 (in Chinese). Haichao chubanshe. p. 312. ISBN 7-80054-595-4.
  13. ^ Hsu Long-hsuen "History of the Sino-Japanese war (1937–1945)" Taipei 1972
  14. ^ a b Clodfelter, Micheal "Warfare and Armed Conflicts: A Statistical Reference", Vol. 2, pp. 956. Includes civilians who died due to famine and other environmental disasters caused by the war. Only includes the 'regular' Chinese army; does NOT include guerrillas and does not include Chinese casualties in Manchuria or Burma.
  15. ^ a b c "Rummel, Table 6A". hawaii.edu. Archived from the original on 13 October 2016. Retrieved 1 January 2017.
  16. ^ a b c d R. J. Rummel. China's Bloody Century. Transaction 1991 ISBN 0-88738-417-X.
  17. ^ a b c Rummel, Rudolph. "Estimates, Sources, and Calculations, July 1937 to August 1945". University of Hawaiʻi (GIF). Archived from the original on 27 December 2015. Retrieved 17 June 2023.
  18. ^ Meng Guoxiang & Zhang Qinyuan, 1995. "关于抗日战争中我国军民伤亡数字问题".
  19. ^ Chidorigafuchi National Cemetery Archived 16 September 2018 at the Wayback Machine Retrieved 10 March 2016
  20. ^ 戦争: 中国侵略(War: Invasion of China) (in Japanese). 読売新聞社. 1983. p. 186. Archived from the original on 12 October 2022. Retrieved 16 January 2017.
  21. ^ He Yingqin, "Eight Year Sino-Japanese War"
  22. ^ R. J. Rummel. China's Bloody Century. Transaction 1991 ISBN 0-88738-417-X. Table 5A
  23. ^ Ho Ping-ti, Studies on the Population of China, 1368–1953, Harvard University Press, 1953. p. 252
  24. ^ Carter, James (20 September 2023). "The Origins of World War II in Asia". The China Project. Retrieved 13 July 2024.
  25. ^ "China's War with Japan". Faculty of History, University of Oxford. Retrieved 13 July 2024.
  26. ^ Bix, Herbert P. (1992), "The Showa Emperor's 'Monologue' and the Problem of War Responsibility", Journal of Japanese Studies, 18 (2): 295–363, doi:10.2307/132824, ISSN 0095-6848, JSTOR 132824
  27. ^ Hsiung & Levine 1992, p. 171.
  28. ^ Todd, Douglas. "Douglas Todd: Lest we overlook the 'Asian Holocaust'". Vancouver Sun. Archived from the original on 9 July 2021. Retrieved 2 July 2021.
  29. ^ Kang, K. (4 August 1995). "Breaking Silence: Exhibit on 'Forgotten Holocaust' Focuses on Japanese War Crimes". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on 19 January 2022. Retrieved 2 July 2021.
  30. ^ Hotta, E. (25 December 2007). Pan-Asianism and Japan's War 1931–1945. Palgrave Macmillan US. p. 40. ISBN 978-0-230-60992-1. Archived from the original on 12 October 2022. Retrieved 28 November 2017.
  31. ^ Paine, S. C. M. (20 August 2012). The Wars for Asia, 1911–1949. Cambridge University Press. p. 123. ISBN 978-1-139-56087-0. Archived from the original on 12 October 2022. Retrieved 28 November 2017.
  32. ^ Mitter (2013), p. 369.
  33. ^ Brinkley, Douglas (2003). The New York Times Living History: World War II, 1942–1945: The Allied Counteroffensive. Macmillan. ISBN 978-0-805-07247-1. Archived from the original on 12 October 2022. Retrieved 2 September 2015.

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