IB History The Sino-japanese War Notes

The Marco Polo Bridge Incident (7 July 1937)

1. On 7 July 1937, Japanese and Chinese troops clashed at Lugouqiao (Marco Polo Bridge) near Beijing. A Japanese soldier went missing during a night exercise, and Japan demanded to search the nearby town of Wanping. China refused, and fighting broke out.
2. Japan used the incident as a pretext to escalate into full-scale war, deploying approximately 200,000 reinforcements to northern China within weeks.
3. Beijing and Tianjin fell to Japan by late July 1937, giving Japan control of key cities in northern China.
4. Chiang Kai-shek made the critical decision to resist rather than appease, opening a second front at Shanghai to draw Japanese forces away from the north and internationalise the conflict.

The Battle of Shanghai and the Fall of Nanjing (1937)

1. The Battle of Shanghai (August to November 1937) was one of the largest battles of the entire war, pitting approximately 700,000 Chinese troops against 300,000 Japanese.
2. China suffered approximately 250,000 casualties compared to Japan's 70,000. Despite fierce resistance, Shanghai fell in November 1937.
3. Japanese forces then advanced rapidly on Nanjing, China's capital. In December 1937, Japanese troops captured the city and carried out the Nanjing Massacre: over six weeks, an estimated 200,000 to 300,000 civilians and prisoners of war were killed.
4. The massacre involved mass rape, looting, and arson. An international safety zone organised by the German businessman John Rabe saved approximately 200,000 civilians from the violence.
5. After the fall of Nanjing, Chiang relocated the capital to Chongqing in China's mountainous interior, signalling his refusal to surrender.

The Course of the War (1938-1941)