The Forgotten Holocaust

This post has no intention of taking anything away from the horrors that the Jewish population faced in Nazi Germany.  Nothing could.  However, what I am going to do is educate you of what has come to be known as the Forgotten Holocaust.  This period of genocide started in 1937 and ended at the conclusion of the Second World War in 1945.  We know about WWII.  Do you know about the Second Sino-Japanese War?  My guess is no.  Do you know about the Tokyo Trials?  Probably not.  How about the Nanking Massacre?  No?  I had a hunch that you wouldn't.  There are reasons for that.  Those reasons will come at the end, so sit back and read this, and you will find out just how cruel humans can really be.
Second Sino-Japanese War:
This war started in July of 1937 when Japan, after invading China, assaulted the Marco Polo Bridge, which was a crucial access point to Beijing.  Japan wasn't looking for a full scale war, but those attempts when Chiang Kai-shek mobilized the army and air force, under his command, assaulted the Japanese in Shanghai, failed.  The Japanese thwarted this assault and shortly after went into Nanjing, (Nanking) towards the end of 1937.  At the start of 1938 the Japanese govt. had lost control of the army in China and the generals escalated the war when they were defeated in Taierzhuang.  After this the IJA (Imperial Japanese Army) had to change its strategy and attack the city of Wuhan, which was the center of operations for China.  After the city's capture the government retreated to Chongqing to set up a provisional capital, and Chiang Kai-shek refused to negotiate unless the Japanese agreed to withdraw their forces to pre-1937 borders.  The Japanese responded by sending in massive air raids on civilian targets in Chongqing, and almost every major city in unoccupied China.  This left millions dead, wounded, and without homes.  The war would end with the Japanese surrender to America on September 9, 1945.  China suffered 20 million dead, and 15 million wounded.  The total number of military dead and wounded is 3.7 million.  This means that 16.3 million civilians were killed during this 8 year conflict.  16.3 million.  That means that for every 1 Jewish person killed under Nazi control nearly 3 Chinese were killed.
The Nanking Massacre (Rape of Nanking):
On December 13, 1937, Japanese forces captured the city of Nanking and during the six-week period that followed, hundreds of thousands of Chinese civilians and disarmed soldiers were murdered.  In addition to that, around 20,000 women, including infants, were brutally raped by soldiers of the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA).  Japan has stated that the figures have been exaggerated, but they do admit to the acts of killing a large number of noncombatants.  It's kinda hard to believe the story from the ones accused.  Japanese officers had a contest amongst themselves of who could be the first to kill 100 people (civilians) using only a sword.  Two 2nd Lieutenants recorded 106 for one and 105 for the other.  Japanese soldiers would throw babies into the air and try to catch them on their bayonets, allowing gravity to slide the infant fully onto the blade.  Little boys would be bayoneted to death.  Some survived.  An 8 year old boy survived being stabbed 5 times according to an American surgeon who was there in 1938 when he wrote home to his family.
The most sickening, and shocking, reports, that came from this time, were the rapes.  As mentioned before about 20,000 women were raped, which included infants and the elderly.  Most of these rapes were systematized in a process where soldiers would go door-to-door searching for young girls.  When found, the soldiers would take the women captive where they would be gang raped.  Usually immediately following the rape, the women were killed.  However, these were often carried out through explicit mutilation.
***I can't stress enough that if you are easily sickened, do not read any further.*** 

The way the women were killed was usually by stabbing.  They were not stabbed in the neck, heart, or stomach.  They were stabbed with objects into their private area.  Objects used were bayonets, long sticks of bamboo, canes, and anything else they could find.  For children and infants, they were cut open to allow the Japanese soldiers to rape them.  Pregnant women weren't exempt.  There are numerous accounts of soldiers lining up women and raping them systematically.  If they came across a pregnant woman, they would rape them, kill the woman by stabbing her in the stomach, cut her open, pull out the fetus, stab the fetus, and throw it away.  This would happen, in front of everyone, including her family members.  If the brother, father, or husband tried to resist, they were killed. 
I apologize for the graphic detail, but there are numerous times where graphic details are used when describing the Holocaust in Europe as well.

After 6 weeks of this, it was over.  Shortly after the surrender of Japan, the primary officers in charge of the IJA troops at Nanking were put on trial. 

Tokyo Trials:
These were the war crimes tribunals that put these officers on trial.  Unfortunately, only 2 defendants were connected to the Nanking Massacre. 
General Matsui, who was charged with being one of the senior officers who "deliberately and recklessly disregarded their legal duty [by virtue of their respective offices] to take adequate steps to secure the observance [of the Laws and Customs of War] and prevent breaches thereof, and thereby violated the laws of war."
Hirota Koki, was the Foreign Minister when Japan conquered Nanking, and was convicted of waging a war of aggression and a war in violation of international laws. 
The two men were senetenced to death by hanging and those sentences were carried out.  18 other men received lesser sentences, but they weren't convicted of being the ones who orchestrated the massacre. 

On August 15, 1995, the 50th anniversary of the surrender of Japan, the Japanese prime minister gave a formal apology for his country's actions in China, during the war.  The atrocities committed during the Second Sino-Japanese War are so bad that Japan doesn't even teach those events to their own children.  They feel that it is better to just forget them and move on.  You are probably asking yourself, "Why haven't I heard this before?"  It's quite simple.  The politicians in this country, wanted this to remain quiet.  Think about how this country reacted when they found out what Germany was doing.  We had a hard time accepting the fact that we needed to stay in that country following the war.  What happened immediately following the surrender of Japan?  We went to war with Communism, and more accurately, Russia.  Japan served as our base of operations, and as our way of having air bases close to Russia.  This would allow quick air missions into Russia if war was ever officially declared.  Would the American public allow us to rebuild Japan, and build our air bases, if they knew what the Japanese had done?  I doubt it.
 What's your opinion of the Japanese now?  Do you see them differently?  Do you think that they should be viewed in the same way as Nazi Germany?  If not, what's the difference?