![]() When Tada discovered this the next day he ordered Yanagawa to stop immediately, but was ignored. On November 19 Yanagawa ordered his 10th Army to pursue retreating Chinese forces across the operation restriction line to Nanking, a flagrant act of insubordination. Yanagawa was likewise eager to conquer Nanking and both men chafed under the operation restriction line that had been imposed on them by the Army General Staff. He was convinced that the conquest of the Chinese capital city of Nanking would provoke the fall of the entire Nationalist Government of China and thus hand Japan a quick and complete victory in its war on China. Matsui made clear to his superiors even before he left for Shanghai that he wanted to march on Nanking. However, a major rift of opinion existed between the Japanese government and its two field armies, the SEA and 10th Army, which as of November were both nominally under the control of the Central China Area Army led by SEA commander Matsui. The city of Nanking is 300 kilometers (186 miles) west of Shanghai. 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. Īlthough 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. 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. ![]() The Japanese responded by dispatching the Shanghai Expeditionary Army (SEA), commanded by General Iwane Matsui, to drive the Chinese Army from Shanghai. 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. 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. Prelude to the battle Japan's decision to capture Nanking 4 Mopping-up operations and the Nanking Massacre.3.1 Collapse of the Nanking Garrison Force.1.1 Japan's decision to capture Nanking.Contrary to Matsui's expectations, China did not surrender and the Second Sino-Japanese War continued for another eight years. Though Japan's military victory excited and emboldened them, the subsequent massacre tarnished their reputation in the eyes of the world. 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.įollowing the capture of the city Japanese soldiers massacred Chinese prisoners of war, murdered civilians, and committed acts of looting and rape in an event known as the Nanking Massacre. Before fleeing, Tang ordered his men to launch a concerted breakout of the Japanese siege, but by this time Nanking was largely surrounded and its defenses were at the breaking point. On December 10 Matsui ordered an all-out attack on Nanking, and after less than two days of intense fighting Chiang decided to abandon the city. By December 9 they had reached the last line of defense, the Fukuo Line, behind which lay Nanking's fortified walls. Japanese soldiers marched from Shanghai to Nanking at a breakneck pace, rapidly defeating pockets of Chinese resistance. Chinese leader Chiang Kai-shek ultimately decided to defend the city and appointed Tang Shengzhi to command the Nanking Garrison Force, a hastily assembled army of local conscripts and the remnants of the Chinese units who had fought in Shanghai. ![]() The task of occupying Nanking was given to General Iwane Matsui, the commander of Japan's Central China Area Army, who believed that the capture of Nanking would force China to surrender and thus end the war. However, after victory in the Battle of Shanghai expansionists prevailed within the Japanese military and on December 1 a campaign to capture Nanking was officially authorized. ![]() 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 Nanking (Nanjing), the capital of the Republic of China.įollowing 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. ![]()
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