ntroduction [1]
The Nanjing (or Nanking) Incident (also known as the Rape of Nanjing, the Nanjing Massacre and the Nanjing Atrocities) remains a highly controversial episode in Sino-Japanese relations. Indeed, as this paper will make clear, it remains so controversial, especially in Japan, that a neutral definition has yet to be agreed upon.[2] However, most would perhaps agree on the following. The Nanjing Incident refers to the killing and raping of large numbers of Chinese over a relatively short period of time by the Japanese military after the city of Nanjing was captured on 13 December 1937. Sadly for the historian, however, the Nanjing Incident is not only an important episode in Sino-Japanese relations, but is also emerging as a fundamental keystone in the construction of the modern Chinese national identity. As a result, the historian's interest in and analysis of this event can be interpreted as an attack on the contemporary Chinese identity,[3] while a refusal to accept the "orthodox" position on Nanjing can be construed as an attempt to deny the Chinese nation a legitimate voice in international society - or, in Iris Chang's words, as a "second rape". Moreover, any demonstrated interest in Nanjing can be viewed in some circles in Japan as "Japan bashing" (in the case of foreign researchers) or "self-flagellation" (in the case of Japanese). In this environment, the debate can become highly emotionally charged, and the historian's struggle to maintain objectivity can quickly fall victim to the demands of contemporary politics.
The importance of the Nanjing Incident to contemporary Sino-Japanese relations can hardly be overstated. Nanjing forms one of the core historical issues on which Japan and China cannot agree, and continues to bedevil the bilateral relationship. It is reflected in the controversy over Japanese history textbooks. It certainly continues to poison Chinese opinion of Japan. Nanjing is also important in understanding contemporary domestic Japanese politics. The debate within Japan about Nanjing (and for that matter textbooks) is also a debate about the legitimacy of the findings of the postwar military tribunals held in Nanjing and especially Tokyo (the Tokyo Trial, or International Military Tribunal for the Far East). One side (the Great Massacre School: see below) is politically and ideologically committed to arguing for the validity of these tribunals and their findings. The Illusion School, on the other hand, is based at least to a certain extent on a rejection of these findings as "victor's justice". The debate in Japan is thus heavily influenced by a broader philosophical and ideological debate on history and historiography, and in particular the debate on the legitimacy of the historical narrative on prewar Japan that emerged from the postwar military tribunals.
Nanjing is a topic that has attracted, especially in the West, and especially on the web, far more activists than historians. It remains a hot domestic and international political issue both in Japan and China. There are large organisations that seem to be involved solely in running anti-Japan and anti-Japanese campaigns about the Nanjing Incident; there are a number of magazines and numerous websites devoted to the Nanjing Incident; and Iris Chang (1997), The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II, has enjoyed phenomenal sales.[4] Despite all the interest in Nanjing, however, the history of the incident remains a largely untold story. Indeed, one of the major problems with the historical research on Nanjing in Japan, where the research is most advanced, is that it has tended to collapse into largely meaningless semantics about whether the sum total of atrocities committed in and around Nanjing can be defined as a "great massacre", or what the definition of "Nanjing" is. Another problem is the obsession with numbers, where the moral and political implications of the discourse about Nanjing are engulfed in a reductionism that focuses solely on the number of victims. There are, however, some encouraging signs that the situation is changing for the better. This paper will attempt to clarify the current state of research on this incident and identify future areas of research.