Commentary: Ironclad Evidence Brooks No Denial

Fifty-six years have passed since the victory of the Chinese people's War of Resistance against Japan. As one of the two major hotbeds of World War II, Japan committed towering crimes in the war, bringing untold sufferings to the Chinese people and inflicting on China a heavy casualty of 35 million soldiers and civilians and an economic loss of US$600 billion.

However, for more than half a century, Japanese right-wing forces, instead of making profound introspection, have constantly engaged in calling back the spirit of the militarist war dead, trying to reverse the verdict on their acts of aggression.

Events relating to history textbooks and Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's Shrine visit have recently occurred one after another, all these cannot but have aroused the Chinese people's vehement indignation and their sorrowful recall of the past national frightful calamity.

Tragic Massacre Rare on Earth

The Japanese aggressors' brutal slaughtering of the Chinese people permeated the whole course of the Japanese aggressive war against China. Shortly after the outbreak of the "September 18, 1931 Incident", Japanese troops buried alive more than 200 Chinese captives in Changchun; and in November caught and killed several hundred wounded soldiers of the units under Ma Zhanshan in Qiqihar; in September 1932, they created the Pingdingshan massacre in the suburbs of Fushun, killing more than 3,000 villagers, leaving only one survival in the whole village.

In the history of Japanese invasion of China, the largest massacre took place in Nanjing. After they captured the city on December 13, 1937, the Japanese aggressor troops under Matsui Iwane started frenzy slaughtering, with blood drenching this ancient city, in this massacre, more than 300,000 Nanjing citizens and disarmed soldiers were murdered, one-third of the streets and buildings were burned; at the same time, the Japanese aggressors also created about 20,000 incidents of raping and carried out large-scale plundering, the cruel and savage Japanese troops had committed really shocking and heinous crimes.

The Japanese aggressor troops pushed the barbarous policy of "burning all, killing all and looting all" in their sanguinary "mop-up" campaign in the anti-Japanese bases, committing countless bloody crimes. Statistics revealed that between 1937-45, in the seven anti-Japanese bases--Shanxi-Suiyuan, Shanxi-Chahar-Hebei, Hebei-Rehe-Liaoning, Shanxi-Hebei-Shandong-Henan, Shandong, Jiangsu-Anhui and Central Plains alone, 3.18 million Chinese soldiers and civilians were killed by Japanese troops.

Bacterial and Chemical Wars Make One Boil with Anger

In the war of aggression against China, Japan, in brazen violation of international law, developed and used bacterial weapons in China and carried out bacterial war, killing innumerable Chinese people. The notorious "731 Troop", the "100 Unit" and other bacterial warfare units totaled more than 20,000 people. They conducted dissection of living persons for lab experiment, the number of people used for this purpose reached from 400 to 600 annually . According to incomplete statistics, from 1939 to August 1945, the "731 Unit" butchered at least 3,000 people.

Beginning from the second half of 1940, the Japanese aggressor troops started large-scale use of bacterial weapons, such as highly and rapidly infectious bacterial spawns of high anti-personnel force, such as cholera, typhoid, pestilence and anthrax bacteria, as well as diphtheria and dysentery bacteria. The areas where Japanese troops conducted bacterial war covered the extensive regions of north China, Central China and Chongqing City, killing hundreds of thousands of Chinese soldiers and innocent people.

Besides the use of bacterial weapons, Japan, from the outset of its aggressive war against China, also used chemical weapons. Japanese troops released poison gas in the Chinese residential quarters and put poison into wells and rivers. According to incomplete statistics, in their war of aggression against China, the Japanese troops used chemical weapons more than 2,000 times, which covered 18 Chinese provinces and regions, inflicting a casualty of more than 90,000 Chinese soldiers and civilians. At the time of Japanese surrender, there were still more than 2 million poison gas bombs abandoned in various parts of China, leaving behind serious harm and hidden trouble to local people.

Economic Pillage Perpetrated by All Means

Economic plunder was one of the basic reasons for Japanese launch of aggressive war, as well as the main content of Japan's policy of "sustaining war with war". Japan's economic plunder of China mainly included the following aspects:

First, forcible requisitioning of grain and raw materials to be supplied to Japanese troops on the front or to be transported out to Japan. In northeast China, Japan forcibly enforced the purchase and sale of grain, compelling peasants to sell most of their grain production at the lowest price stipulated by the puppet government. In areas inside Shanhaiguan Pass, Japanese troops looted army provisions in a disguised manner. In 1939, Japan transported out 700 million liters of grain from central China alone, in 1940, the figure rose to upwards of 900 million liters. In addition, Japan also wantonly plundered China's mineral resources.

Second, monopolizing industry, agriculture, communications and trade, carrying out the export of capital. In May 1937, through the puppet Manchurian government, Japan published the "important industrial control method", under which 21 kinds of industrial products were placed under Japan's control.

Third, controlling the banking business, Japan issued large amounts of paper money, extorting the wealth of the people in the occupied areas. Japan issued large amounts of puppet "Manchurian yuan" in northeast China. In areas inside Shanhaiguan Pass, from November 1937 to January 1941 Japan set up banks such as the puppet Mongolia-Xinjiang Bank, the China Joint Reserve Bank, and the "Central Reserve Bank respectively in Zhangjiakou, Beiping, Shanghai and Nanjing, relying on Japanese troops' bayonets, Japan issued huge amounts of counterfeit bank-notes without any credit value, so as to squeeze the blood and sweat and wealth of the Chinese people.

Fourth, drafting Chinese laborers to work like horses for Japanese militarists. Incomplete statistics show that by the end of 1944, the number of laborers forcibly drafted in northeast China by the Japanese reached 3 million, of whom 29 percent of the total were persecuted to death. Particularly noteworthy was that during the Japanese war of aggression against China, countless Chinese women were forced by Japanese troops to serve as "comfort women", being subjected to inhuman treatment.

Those were not all the towering crimes committed by Japanese militarists against the Chinese people. The Chinese and Japanese peoples must constantly expose Japanese militarists' crimes of aggression, and oppose any wrong behavior in covering up and distorting history, so as to clarify matters to the public worldwide, so that those who had experienced World War II will not forget the past, and the new generation will understand the historical truth, thereby fighting unremittingly for maintaining the general situation of peace and development of humankind.

The above is the full text of the commentary, which was written by Sun Wuzhou and published on Page 6 of People's Daily on August 17.

People's Daily Online --- http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/