The Nanking Massacre and Iris Chang's Book The Rape of Nanking

[Unkotare]

Actually, I took an oath to defend the constitution...

The Constitution of what country?

 

[Unkotare]

...

The facts of history is the Japanese were bastards in WWII.

Not sure why you are trying to claim anything else.

Japan was our enemy during WWII. No one has said anything else, no matter what your atheist religion tells you.

 

[JoeB131]

Wow, that settles that!

Actually, it does.

Every argument Mormon Mike makes about the Tokyo Trial, can be made about Nuremburg being "Victor's Justice".

The judges were biased, having come from the countries Germany/Japan made war on, and a lot of people put in the dock were not the ones making the decisions.

If anything, the Tokyo trial was probably more fair in that justices from minor powers were allowed to participate. Unfortunately, that included a hack from India who was determined to dissent before he heard a word of evidence.

 

[Unkotare]

Actually, it does.
...

 

[JoeB131]

Japan was our enemy during WWII. No one has said anything else, no matter what your atheist religion tells you.

they were the enemy of humanity during WWII, which is why their leaders were tried for "Crimes against Humanity".

Do you do special exercises to stay this stupid?

 

[Unkotare]

they were the enemy of humanity during WWII, which is why their leaders were tried for "Crimes against Humanity".

Do you do special exercises to stay this stupid?

Good boy. You'll get dessert tonight.

 

[mikegriffith1]

Let's take yet another look at the crucial population evidence. That evidence provides us with another telling argument against the 300,000 civilian death toll fantasy. Dr. Shudo Higashinakano, a professor of history at Asia University in Tokyo, explains the importance of this evidence in his book The Nanking Massacre: Fact vs. Fiction (2005):

The Japanese did not allow ordinary citizens free access to those gates [the gates of the walled city of Nanking] until two and a half months had elapsed. Nevertheless, 20 days before and immediately prior to the fall of Nanking, the city’s population was 200,000, according to Europeans and Americans who were there at the time. Eight days after the fall and on Christmas Eve, it was still 200,000. No one indicated a vast decrease in population due to mass slaughter. Confronted by these facts, how can anyone claim that 300,000 noncombatants were murdered in Nanking? (p. ii) (Dr. Higashinakano’s book is available online at http://www.sdh-fact.com/CL02_1/9_S4.pdf)

As mentioned in previous replies, Dr. Lewis Smythe, based on his extensive survey conducted weeks after the massacre, said that Nanking’s population was between 200,000 and 250,000 when the Japanese arrived (War Damage in the Nanking Area, December 1937 to March 1938, Nanking International Relief Committee, June 1938, p. 4). As of March 1938, Smythe put the population of Nanking at 221,000 (War Damage in the Nanking Area, p. 8).

As of December 21, eight days after the Japanese had occupied the city, the Nanking International Relief Committee put the city’s population at 200,000, as Dr. Higashinakano points out:

Document No. 10, dated December 18, states, “We 22 Westerners cannot feed 200,000 Chinese civilians….” The Committee appealed to the Japanese military for help.

Document No. 20, dated December 21, mentions difficulties the Committee had experienced in supplying food and fuel to 200,000 civilians, and adds, “The present situation is automatically and rapidly leading to a serious famine.” (The Nanking Massacre: Fact vs. Fiction, p. 152) (By the way, the Japanese then began to distribute large amounts of food to city residents.)

We also read the following in Document No. 10, which is a letter written on December 18 by the International Committee for the Nanking Safety Zone to the Japanese Embassy in Nanking:

Dear Sirs: We are very sorry to trouble you again with the sufferings and needs of the 200,000 civilians for whom we are trying to care make it urgent that we try to secure action from your military authorities to stop the present disorder among Japanese soldiers wandering through the Safety Zone. (International Military Tribunal for the Far East: Transcript of Proceedings, August 29, 1946, p. 4516)

Lily Abegg, a European newspaper correspondent in China, was in Nanking shortly before the Japanese arrived, and she reported that as of November 29 there were, at most, about 150,000 people in the city:

Now there are at most 150,000 people remaining, but the waves of evacuees seem interminable. (The Nanking Massacre: Fact vs. Fiction, p. 30, citing Lily Abegg, “Wie wir aus Nanking flüchteten: Die letzten Tage in der Haupstadt Chinas” in Frankfurter Zeitung, 19 December 1937)

The chief of the National Police Agency reported that as of November 28 there were “200,000 residents remaining here in Nanking” (The Nanking Massacre: Fact vs. Fiction, p. 151). This was 15 days before the Japanese entered the city.

The obvious and crucial point is this: Since Nanking’s population was 150,000 to 200,000 as of late November, two weeks before the Japanese arrived, and was 200,000 as of December 21, eight days after the city fell, and was 221,000 in March, three months after the city fell, there is no way the Japanese killed 300,000 people in Nanking and the immediate surrounding area, especially since most of the surrounding area was deserted, and much of the city itself was deserted.

I’ve already made the point that virtually all the early accounts of the massacre put the death toll in the tens of thousands, not in the hundreds of thousands. One of those early accounts comes from Rev. Miner Searle Bates. Bates was a famous Christian missionary who taught at the University of Nanking. Bates was also an adviser to the Nationalist government’s Ministry of Information. As is well known to scholars, when Bates provided his contribution to Harold Timperly’s book What War Means, he put the total death toll at 42,000—12,000 civilians and 30,000 soldiers. Dr. Higashinakano:

Rev. Bates inserted language to the effect that 12,000 civilians and 30,000 soldiers had been killed in Nanking into Chapter 3 of What War Means. The Ministry of Information should have been delighted to disseminate news of a massacre with some 40,000 victims. (The Nanking Massacre: Fact vs. Fiction, p. iv)

Dr. Smythe stated that the records of burials in and near the city indicated that about 12,000 civilians were killed by violence:

A careful estimate from the burials in the city and in areas adjacent to the wall, indicates 12,000 civilians killed by violence. The tens of thousands of unarmed or disarmed soldiers are not considered in these lists. (War Damage in the Nanking Area, p. 8)

Dr. Smythe added that about 1,000 of those civilian deaths were collateral fatalities from military operations, i.e., they were killed in crossfire or artillery exchanges between the Chinese and Japanese military forces.

Why do Iris Chang’s apologists ignore all this evidence, and also ignore other evidence that likewise supports the same figures, and instead insist on clinging to Chang’s mythical figure of 300,000 civilian deaths? Why can’t they be satisfied with pointing out that the Japanese army killed about 12,000 civilians in Nanking and the immediate surrounding area, and possibly another 30,000 in several of the surrounding prefectures? By any measurement, that is a terrible atrocity and war crime.

In his second survey, which included a huge area around Nanking, Smythe concluded that about 30,000 civilians had been killed in this large surrounding area, which puts his civilian death toll at 42,000. There are problems with his 30,000 figure for the expanded area because the Japanese were never in most of that area, and because much of that area was deserted. Given the huge size of the area (equal to the state of Delaware and half of Rhode Island), some civilians may indeed have been killed in the places where the Japanese army marched on its way to Nanking, although the army was racing to get to Nanking and thus had little time to stop and slaughter local Chinese, and few Chinese would have been anywhere near the Japanese army's two marching routes to Nanking anyway. But, for the sake of argument, let's go with Smythe's figure of 30,000 civilian deaths for the large area of his second survey.

By any measurement, killing 12,000 civilians in and near the city, not to mention killing 30,000 more civilians in the huge surrounding area beyond the city, is a horrific crime that deserves the harshest condemnation and punishment. So why do Chang’s defenders refuse to abandon her discredited 300,000 figure? Here’s one reason: The Nationalists killed at least 400,000 people in the Yellow River Atrocity (aka the Yellow River Flood) in 1938 when they deliberately breached the Yellow River Dam and flooded thousands of square miles in Henan, Anhui, and Jiangsu to stop a non-existent Japanese advance. Can you imagine what Chang’s apologists would be saying if the Japanese had done this?

By the way, the Nationalists initially claimed that the Japanese had caused the flood by bombing the dam. However, this lie was soon exposed thoroughly enough that the Nationalists were forced to admit that they were the ones who had breached the dam.

 

[JoeB131]

Let's take yet another look at the crucial population evidence. That evidence provides us with another telling argument against the 300,000 civilian death toll fantasy. Dr. Shudo Higashinakano, a professor of history at Asia University in Tokyo, explains the importance of this evidence in his book The Nanking Massacre: Fact vs. Fiction (2005):

Wow, another Japanese "scholar" says Japan didn't do nothing.

Color me shocked.

As mentioned in previous replies, Dr. Lewis Smythe, based on his extensive survey conducted weeks after the massacre, said that Nanking’s population was between 200,000 and 250,000 when the Japanese arrived

Well, yeah, the population WAS a lot less AFTER the Japanese slaughtered all those people. Hello.

Why do Iris Chang’s apologists ignore all this evidence, and also ignore other evidence that likewise supports the same figures, and instead insist on clinging to Chang’s mythical figure of 300,000 civilian deaths? Why can’t they be satisfied with pointing out that the Japanese army killed about 12,000 civilians in Nanking and the immediate surrounding area, and possibly another 30,000 in several of the surrounding prefectures? By any measurement, that is a terrible atrocity and war crime.

Why?

Because frankly, lowballing the number is exonerating the Japanese, when unlike the Germans, they have never really taken responsibility for the horror they inflicted on so much of the world.

I give Japan credit for being a model world citizen SINCE the end of the war, but during the war, their actions were inexcusable.

But here's Axis Mikey, trying to make excuses for them.

 

[Unkotare]

Wow, another Japanese "scholar" says Japan didn't do nothing.....

In your failure you have been reduced to ungrammatical stammering. You must be under a lot of pressure.

 

[Unkotare]

.... unlike the Germans, they have never really taken responsibility for the horror they inflicted on so much of the world.
....

List of war apology statements issued by Japan - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[JoeB131]

In your failure you have been reduced to ungrammatical stammering. You must be under a lot of pressure.

None at all.. I was engaging in mockery.

List of war apology statements issued by Japan - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Wow, an apology? Wow, really. Yeah, that makes everything better.

"Sorry for the Genocide, guys".

How about some fucking reparations, to start with.

 

[Unkotare]

None at all.. I was engaging in mockery.



Wow, an apology? Wow, really. Yeah, that makes everything better.

"Sorry for the Genocide, guys".

How about some fucking reparations, to start with.

$1.5 billion, you idiot.

 

[mikegriffith1]

The sheer impossible mechanics of burying 300,000 bodies makes the 300,000 civilian death toll claim implausible and unbelievable. Consider the fact that 300,000 bodies would fill three NFL 100,000-seat stadiums. Burying them would require a massive burial area, hundreds of hours, and hundreds or thousands of workers.

This brings us to another fatal flaw in the 300,000-dead story: the burial records. Even after obvious double-counting and the inclusion of combat deaths, not to mention subsequent outright fabrication, the burial records do not support anything close to Iris Chang’s incredible figure of 300,000-plus civilian deaths.

When Smythe and Bates studied the burial records shortly after the massacre, they concluded there had been about 12,000 civilian deaths, with Smythe adding the caveat that about 1,000 of those were people who were killed by crossfire during combat.

In early April, the two organizations that handled the burials—the Red Swastika Society and the Tsun-shan-tang—reported that they buried a combined total of 150,000/155,000 bodies, from both in and outside the city, as of March. Then, months later, the Tsun-shan-tang claimed that during three weeks in April, they buried an additional 105,000 bodies. Nobody denies that the burials from December through April included thousands of soldiers who died in combat, thousands of soldiers who were executed because they had shed their uniforms (under the standard laws of war, the Japanese had the right to execute them), and some non-massacre-related deaths (illness, old age, etc.).

Even taking these numbers at face value, they get you nowhere near 300,00 civilian deaths. 155,000 burials plus the alleged additional 105,000 burials equals 260,000 burials. Assuming that only half of those burials were soldiers killed in combat or executed for being in civilian clothes, that gets you to 130,000 civilian deaths, less than half the number posited by Iris Chang and her defenders.

Furthermore, as we’ve seen, even positing 130,000 civilian deaths is problematic given the population evidence and the death-toll estimates in the primary sources.

Moreover, there is also the fact that the burial evidence is riddled with problems. For example, let’s take a look at the Tsun-shan-tang’s claim that they buried an additional 105,000 bodies in three weeks in April. 105,000 burials in three weeks? This would have required an amazing rate of 5,000 burials per day. One reason this number is extremely doubtful is that during the period from mid-December through March, the Tsun-shan-tang, according to their own report, buried an average of 75 bodies per day. Yet we’re supposed to believe that in a three-week period in April, they buried 666 times more bodies per day than they had buried in the preceding three months, a staggering increase of 6,600 percent.

Significantly, the IMTFE, after studying the Tsun-shan-lang records, concluded that the group buried a total of 112,266 bodies from December 26 to April 20 (IMTFE transcript, August 29, 1946, p. 4537). So even the IMTFE did not buy the organization’s claim that they buried 215,000 bodies from December through April.

Even the figure of 150,000 to 155,000 burials from mid-December to March is problematic. Many scholars have pointed out several problems with the 155,000 figure. Dr. Hata points out that even Yoshiaki Itakura, the highly respected Japanese scholar who exposed Masaaki Tanaka's tampering with General Matsui’s diary, rejected the 155,000 number as unrealistic and adjusted it down to 39,859:

The number of corpses buried by both of the two private charity groups is often said to have been a total of 155,000. This statistic counts civilians who died during the battle or died of disease, and probably also soldiers who died in combat. Furthermore, doubts have been expressed about the accuracy of the records. Itakura's calculations adjust this statistic to 39,859 corpses, a figure which comes close to the roughly 40,000 corpses estimated by Bates and Smythe of the International Committee. (The Nanking Incident: The Structure of a Massacre, pp. 211-212)

When you read the IMTFE transcripts, you discover that most of the incidents described in the statements occurred during the first two or three weeks after the Japanese occupied Nanking, and that most of them—not all, but the vast majority—describe a small number of victims—two here, three there, ten here, four there, eight here, six there, etc., etc. If you doubt this, just go read the IMTFE prosecution exhibits.

Another fact you will clearly see in the IMTFE transcripts is that the violent acts were not done as part of any systematic or official command policy of General Matsui, much less of the Japanese government, but were done by some local units and by roaming bands of enlisted personnel. The December 16 protest that the International Committee for the Nanking Safety Zone sent to the Japanese Embassy in Nanking noted that “most of the trouble has come from wandering groups of three to four soldiers without an officer” (IMTFE transcript, p. 4510, prosecution document 1744, exhibit number 323).

Two weeks later, on December 29, the International Committee reported that the number of cases of violence and crime were declining and that the situation had “much improved”:

We are glad to report that cases are declining and conditions are much improved. (IMTFE transcript, p. 4533)

On January 2, four days after the December 29 report, the International Committee told the Japanese Embassy that, although there were still some cases of criminal acts, the situation had improved “a great deal”:

We appreciated very much your statement to us on the 29th that wandering Japanese soldiers had been ordered to stay out of the Safety Zone. This has improved the situation a great deal. (IMTFE transcript, p. 4534)

Thus, most of the killing occurred in the first two or three weeks of the Japanese occupation. This means that most of the alleged 300,000 civilian deaths would have had to occur in no more than three weeks, not three months.

Add to these data the fact that not a single photo of Nanking taken during the massacre shows numerous piles of bodies, not even photos that provide a panoramic view.

 

[JoeB131]

The sheer impossible mechanics of burying 300,000 bodies makes the 300,000 civilian death toll claim implausible and unbelievable. Consider the fact that 300,000 bodies would fill three NFL 100,000-seat stadiums. Burying them would require a massive burial area, hundreds of hours, and hundreds or thousands of workers.

This sounds like the kind of argument a Holocaust denier would make.

Works on the assumption all these people were buried. Many of them were probably cremated, which is the tradition in Buddhist and Taoist traditions. Cremation was also the preferred method of disposing of bodies in Japan.

In early April, the two organizations that handled the burials—the Red Swastika Society and the Tsun-shan-tang—reported that they buried a combined total of 150,000/155,000 bodies, from both in and outside the city, as of March. Then, months later, the Tsun-shan-tang claimed that during three weeks in April, they buried an additional 105,000 bodies.

So doing simple math, even you admit that 260K bodies were buried.

Assuming that only half of those burials were soldiers killed in combat or executed for being in civilian clothes, that gets you to 130,000 civilian deaths, less than half the number posited by Iris Chang and her defenders.

Why do you think it was acceptable to execute prisoners of war?

 

[mikegriffith1]

This sounds like the kind of argument a Holocaust denier would make.

This is the kind of sleazy, dishonest argument that would be made by a Mao-loving wingnut who regularly repeats Nazi and neo-Nazi propaganda about Jews and Israel.

Works on the assumption all these people were buried. Many of them were probably cremated, which is the tradition in Buddhist and Taoist traditions. Cremation was also the preferred method of disposing of bodies in Japan.

One, cremation takes 2-3 hours and requires a blast furnace. Two, this diversionary argument ignores the Tsun-shan-tang's own claim about the number of burials. Three, this diversionary argument also ignores what the Tokyo Tribunal concluded about the number of burials.

So doing simple math, even you admit that 260K bodies were buried.

Huh? I'm shaking my head trying to fathom how you could draw such an absurd inference from my reply.

Why do you think it was acceptable to execute prisoners of war?

How many times per month do you beat your partner? How often do you walk out of a restaurant without paying? How many children have you abducted in the last five years?

Of course, your dishonest juvenile question assumes I have said that executing POWs is acceptable, which I have never said.

Now, as some might think you should know, if a soldier removes his uniform and dresses as a civilian during wartime, under the Geneva Convention and other treaties, he is not entitled to POW status but can be executed if he is caught. Thousands of Chinese soldiers did exactly that and were executed. You're not referring to those soldiers, are you? They were not POWs.

It is never acceptable to execute a POW, unless he murders another POW or kills a guard--but even in those cases he is entitled to due process and a fair trial.

Finally, I note that you have once again simply ignored the evidence presented to you and have offered nothing but lame strawman arguments and evasions in response. Do you not think it is obvious to objective readers that you have no answer for the evidence and are just dismissing it because you don't want to believe it?

 

[JoeB131]

This is the kind of sleazy, dishonest argument that would be made by a Mao-loving wingnut who regularly repeats Nazi and neo-Nazi propaganda about Jews and Israel.

I just tell the truth about the Zionists.

As for my opinion of Mao, I probably have a less favorable opinion of him than 1.5 billion Chinese, who see him as a national hero.

So why are you an Axis apologist all the time?

One, cremation takes 2-3 hours and requires a blast furnace. Two, this diversionary argument ignores the Tsun-shan-tang's own claim about the number of burials. Three, this diversionary argument also ignores what the Tokyo Tribunal concluded about the number of burials.

You can burn a body with just some gasoline. That's what they did to Hitler and Eva Braun (no doubt a sad day for you.)

The point was, that you admit that the legitimate aid agencies claimed to have buried 260K bodies. I just submit some bodies never were found. Buried in places they weren't found, etc.

Huh? I'm shaking my head trying to fathom how you could draw such an absurd inference from my reply.

How could I not? YOu claimed that it was okay that Japan executed Chinese soldiers who had shed their uniforms. In short, people who were no longer fighting and were just seeking to escape. (Given most of the Nationalist Army was unwitting conscripts who were given little to no training, it was an understandable instinct.

Now, as some might think you should know, if a soldier removes his uniform and dresses as a civilian during wartime, under the Geneva Convention and other treaties, he is not entitled to POW status but can be executed if he is caught. Thousands of Chinese soldiers did exactly that and were executed. You're not referring to those soldiers, are you? They were not POWs.

Um, that;s not the case at all.

If they abandon their uniforms and weapons, they are no longer combatants.

Finally, I note that you have once again simply ignored the evidence presented to you and have offered nothing but lame strawman arguments and evasions in response. Do you not think it is obvious to objective readers that you have no answer for the evidence and are just dismissing it because you don't want to believe it?

Axis Mikey, I'm just mocking you at this point.

Just remember..

Iris Chang got three books published.

You are a crank who posts manifestos on the Internet and can't keep your links working.

 

[Unkotare]

Joeblow is failing badly.

 

[JoeB131]

Joeblow is failing badly.

Unkotard is desperate for attention.

Maybe try adding something to a conversation, that works wonders.

 

[Unkotare]

Unkotard is desperate for attention.

Maybe try adding something to a conversation, that works wonders.

The offer to compare threads started still stands, spineless. You ready?

 

[JoeB131]

The offer to compare threads started still stands, spineless. You ready?

I don't start threads, guy.

Number of threads started isn't the point, it's the lack of substance inmost of your posts.

Axis Mikey might be a Mormon Idiot and a Japanese apologist, but at least he adds substance, as crazy as it is.

Your posts all consist of how you don't like other posters, which is why I mostly keep you on ignore.