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m4heeen's review against another edition
sad
tense
medium-paced
I don't think giving this a rating is appropriate because it feels like I'm weighing the pain and suffering that the people in Nanking underwent through the Japanese occupation. It's beyond disgusting that Japan not only continues to deny the existence of this massacre but masks it with propaganda, censorship, and cover-ups. The people of Nanking will receive their justice and Japan will pay the price for their gruesome actions.
sidharthvardhan's review against another edition
5.0
Okay, I waited for the holiday season to be over before I put this review. The review contains information of gruesome violence and depressing images. If you want to stay in good mood, don't read it. I don't think it will change anything.
Have you ever noticed how our compassion seems to work on a sort of value-index? The higher a victim of some tragedy scores on that index, the more the compassion of the world (s)he gets. To calculate your own value make a list of items – non-white, non-Euro-American, women, not very beautiful (the ‘oh! Why it had to happen to her, she was so beautiful’ syndrome), too poor to be visible etc. The more items a victim tick, the less the sympathy (s)he has of people.
People of Nanking didn’t tick most of these items and so their mass-murders and mass-rape were ignored by the world, ignored not as in they didn’t make it to newspapers, Japanese, in their arrogance, made sure that the mass murders make the news
..... but rather the whole world chose to do nothing about it.
In fact, the then president of States was more ‘disturbed’ by sinking of Panay – a USS but, well, then it was full of western people.
And seriously, how many people still think that allies (US, UK, France etc) were fighting the world war to save Jew? Hitler actually offered them Jewish citizen as refugees which allies refused. Second World War was all about power. And Japan, whose war crimes included live burials, mutilation, nailing prisoners, death by fire, cannibalism, forced prostitution of women from captured countries – the ‘comfort women’, forcing incest upon helpless captives, rape of women from ages 8 to 80+, impalement of vaginas, medical experiments, “water treatment” that pumped water or kerosene into the noses and mouths of victims until their bowels ruptured, suspension of POWs by wrists, arms, or legs until their joints were literally ripped from their sockets, victims being forced to kneel on sharp instruments, excruciating extractions of nails from fingers, electric shock torture, naked women forced to sit on charcoal stoves, every imaginable form of beating and flogging etc, was more or less never asked to account for its action, never asked to compensate its victims. The officers and the king who issued the orders to kill captives remain untouched even after Japanese surrender in second world war. And why? Because US saw Japan as a potential friend against Russia, just as two Chinese governments 'forgive' Japan in expectation of trade contacts (the governments had no rights to forgive on behalf of those individuals, they weren't even contacted). There are no good or bad nations, nations have no conscience.
While those who committed those crimes lived a life of luxury, the survivors of Nanking, rape victims (reminds me of how the slave makers of Africa and slave owners of States are some of the richest families in their countries) and 'comfort women' had to live a life of poverty and (in the case of women, since Eastern world, chastity among women continues to be considered a virtue) disgrace, suffering from psychological shock and a large number committed suicide.
How can someone be so inhuman?
Probably the most difficult question is what made people do such things – the rape of Nanking, the Holocaust etc? Chang does answer this question as far as Nanking is concerned in many ways, and they are more or less same as in the case of Holocaust, slavery, the presently on-going violance in middle-East and Africa.
1. Racial superiority – Japanese thought themselves superior people, the only people of god.
2. Ultra-nationalism – Like religion, Nationalism excuses murders and mass violence.
3. Milllitary culture – Samurai culture is not as pleasant as it appears in western movies
4. Submissiveness to the will of king – power corrupts and absolute power ...
The Heroes
Not all kept their silence though, within Nanking, a few brave foreign individuals fought for the captives. Within Nanking, a few Europeans and Americans constantly put their lives at risk in saving innocent Chinese lives.
The biggest savior of Nanking people was John Rabe, a german merchant in China - (and here is the time to gasp) a Nazi, and if that is not enough, a Nazi who wrote to Hitler to intervene and ask Japan to stop their war crimes (Hitler, of course, did nothing). Rabe didn’t know what his own party back in Germany was doing to Jews and would later suffer because of his association with it. In China, though he was like messiah. He created and managed a safety zone which provided shelter to residents of Nanking and along with a few Europeans and Americans policed it against Japanese soldiers. The detestable Nazi Savastik actually helped him protect innocent lives.
There were a few other foreigners who stood for innocent Chinese rather than fleeing. Chang goes into detail talking about two more of them. These heroes, who continue to fight for Nanking long after the rape was over - against Japanese effort to censor the information, ended up no better in their lives than the survivors in their later life. Some went mad from psychological shock, some committed suicide.
Stupid Criticisms
There are some stupid criticisms of the book in the reviews here on Goodreads such as –
1. It is sensationalist because of the word ‘holocaust’ in sub-heading – one of the reviewers called it sensationalist but I don’t think Chang could have got the event the well-deserved attention otherwise and scenes of violence are just as gruesome. I mean how many of you have heard about Nanking? How many have heard about Auschwitz?
“It is not just that Japan has doled out less than 1 percent of the amount that Germany has paid in war reparations to its victims. It is not just that, unlike most Nazis, who, if not incarcerated for their crimes were at least forced from public life, many Japanese war criminals continued to occupy powerful positions in industry and government after the war. And it is not just the fact that while Germans have made repeated apologies to their Holocaust victims, the Japanese have enshrined their war criminals in Tokyo—an act that one American wartime victim of the Japanese has labeled politically equivalent to “erecting a cathedral for Hitler in the middle of Berlin.“
Add to the list, the fact that Japanese continue to censor information about these war crimes.
2.It is not well researched – it uses information from at least four different countries and as many languages from different means – witnesses accounts, photographs, video clippings, newspaper reports (including Japanese ones), personal diaries, confessions of some Japanese scholars themselves etc.
3.It uses only eye witnesses accounts – See 1. Above
4.It gives a one-sided account of the story – I’m sorry Japanese that ultra-nationalists didn’t get their voice but seriously Chang thinks that the Japanese soldiers involved in the acts were themselves victims of a system of oppression:
5.It is racist – On the contrary, she rejects any racist interpretations of the event.
6. It criticises Japanese culture – I keep hearing this one in India too, but why is it even an argument? Why is something considered beyond criticism if it can be called ‘culture’ of any country? And any culture which promotes racist thinking kills compassion or excuses such meaningless violence is worth criticising. Chang is critical of the only military culture of Japan and not its other traditions.
And that kind of culture which asks people to get used to violence is detestable everywhere. Japan learned it from America and now China seems to have learned it too. And it will go on, when all over the world, the most progressive people see nothing wrong in letting their children play with toy-guns and violent video-games.
What is most disheartening is indifference the world is able could acquire. The whole world knew about Nanking just they know about the presently going genocide in Darfur and Rwanda. Or maybe we should learn to expect such behaviour - of forgetting the whole thing or putting a new UN resolution of 'never again' every time it happens.
And you may think that nations are afraid of political action, but helping famine victims inSomalia didn't need political intervention. And a negligible percentage of money wasted on arms race the world over could have saved those lives. Unlike a drought, a famine is not a natural failure, it is a human failure and can be avoided by timely action. But just like in Rwanda where UN refuse to call it genocide (that would have meant that they will have to do something) , in Somalia they waited patiently before a famine was declared ignoring the warning signs.
And soon, it will be Nigeria's turn.
To be honest, in a world where Trumps, Modis, Putins, Britexits are admired, where a US president, who is also a Nobel Peace laureate, refuses to apologise on behalf of his country for Heroshima and Nagasaki - calling them 'difficult decisions. I don't think Nigeria can hope for much.
Most people I meet tend to lovers of humanity - having a great faith in it, and what is the point in living if you have nothing higher to believe. That is why we all tend to think negatively of misanthropists - we want to disagree with Gulliver's conclusions who started feeling disgusted at his fellow-humans after his travels, I remember an interviewer showing his shock and refusing to believe that George Carlin was serious when later told him he didn't expect humanity to get any better - but I wonder whether it is a result of our ignorance or deliberate forgetfulness that we continue to hold on to this belief. Maybe it is a conclusion we must deny, we would never have had dreams if lying to oneself wasn't a part of living. Still it can't always be easy, there are people, I believe, who like Quentin, after he was disillusioned about Southern misogynist-racist culture, struggle to deny their hatred upon seeing this ugly face of humanity.
Spoiler
“The Japanese, I learned, sliced babies not just in half but in thirds and fourths, they said; the Yangtze River ran red with blood for days.”
“Chinese witnesses saw Japanese rape girls under ten years of age in the streets and then slash them in half by sword. In some cases, the Japanese sliced open the vaginas of preteen girls in order to ravish them more effectively.”
Have you ever noticed how our compassion seems to work on a sort of value-index? The higher a victim of some tragedy scores on that index, the more the compassion of the world (s)he gets. To calculate your own value make a list of items – non-white, non-Euro-American, women, not very beautiful (the ‘oh! Why it had to happen to her, she was so beautiful’ syndrome), too poor to be visible etc. The more items a victim tick, the less the sympathy (s)he has of people.
People of Nanking didn’t tick most of these items and so their mass-murders and mass-rape were ignored by the world, ignored not as in they didn’t make it to newspapers, Japanese, in their arrogance, made sure that the mass murders make the news
"on their way to the capital, Japanese soldiers were made to participate in killing competitions, which were avidly covered by the Japanese media like sporting events. The most notorious one appeared in the December 7 issue of the Japan Advertiser under the headline “Sub-Lieutenants in Race to Fell 100 Chinese Running Close Contest.”
..... but rather the whole world chose to do nothing about it.
In fact, the then president of States was more ‘disturbed’ by sinking of Panay – a USS but, well, then it was full of western people.
And seriously, how many people still think that allies (US, UK, France etc) were fighting the world war to save Jew? Hitler actually offered them Jewish citizen as refugees which allies refused. Second World War was all about power. And Japan, whose war crimes included live burials, mutilation, nailing prisoners, death by fire, cannibalism, forced prostitution of women from captured countries – the ‘comfort women’, forcing incest upon helpless captives, rape of women from ages 8 to 80+, impalement of vaginas, medical experiments, “water treatment” that pumped water or kerosene into the noses and mouths of victims until their bowels ruptured, suspension of POWs by wrists, arms, or legs until their joints were literally ripped from their sockets, victims being forced to kneel on sharp instruments, excruciating extractions of nails from fingers, electric shock torture, naked women forced to sit on charcoal stoves, every imaginable form of beating and flogging etc, was more or less never asked to account for its action, never asked to compensate its victims. The officers and the king who issued the orders to kill captives remain untouched even after Japanese surrender in second world war. And why? Because US saw Japan as a potential friend against Russia, just as two Chinese governments 'forgive' Japan in expectation of trade contacts (the governments had no rights to forgive on behalf of those individuals, they weren't even contacted). There are no good or bad nations, nations have no conscience.
“In exchange for Japan’s surrender, the American government granted him, the emperor of Japan, immunity from trial, so he was not called in as a defendant or even a witness. Because the terms of the surrender exonerated all members of the Japanese imperial family, Hirohito’s uncle Prince Asaka (under whose command the “Kill All Captives” order was forged) also escaped justice, exempting him from having to appear at the IMTFE at all.”
While those who committed those crimes lived a life of luxury, the survivors of Nanking, rape victims (reminds me of how the slave makers of Africa and slave owners of States are some of the richest families in their countries) and 'comfort women' had to live a life of poverty and (in the case of women, since Eastern world, chastity among women continues to be considered a virtue) disgrace, suffering from psychological shock and a large number committed suicide.
How can someone be so inhuman?
Probably the most difficult question is what made people do such things – the rape of Nanking, the Holocaust etc? Chang does answer this question as far as Nanking is concerned in many ways, and they are more or less same as in the case of Holocaust, slavery, the presently on-going violance in middle-East and Africa.
1. Racial superiority – Japanese thought themselves superior people, the only people of god.
2. Ultra-nationalism – Like religion, Nationalism excuses murders and mass violence.
3. Milllitary culture – Samurai culture is not as pleasant as it appears in western movies
4. Submissiveness to the will of king – power corrupts and absolute power ...
The Heroes
Not all kept their silence though, within Nanking, a few brave foreign individuals fought for the captives. Within Nanking, a few Europeans and Americans constantly put their lives at risk in saving innocent Chinese lives.
The biggest savior of Nanking people was John Rabe, a german merchant in China - (and here is the time to gasp) a Nazi, and if that is not enough, a Nazi who wrote to Hitler to intervene and ask Japan to stop their war crimes (Hitler, of course, did nothing). Rabe didn’t know what his own party back in Germany was doing to Jews and would later suffer because of his association with it. In China, though he was like messiah. He created and managed a safety zone which provided shelter to residents of Nanking and along with a few Europeans and Americans policed it against Japanese soldiers. The detestable Nazi Savastik actually helped him protect innocent lives.
There were a few other foreigners who stood for innocent Chinese rather than fleeing. Chang goes into detail talking about two more of them. These heroes, who continue to fight for Nanking long after the rape was over - against Japanese effort to censor the information, ended up no better in their lives than the survivors in their later life. Some went mad from psychological shock, some committed suicide.
Stupid Criticisms
There are some stupid criticisms of the book in the reviews here on Goodreads such as –
1. It is sensationalist because of the word ‘holocaust’ in sub-heading – one of the reviewers called it sensationalist but I don’t think Chang could have got the event the well-deserved attention otherwise and scenes of violence are just as gruesome. I mean how many of you have heard about Nanking? How many have heard about Auschwitz?
“It is not just that Japan has doled out less than 1 percent of the amount that Germany has paid in war reparations to its victims. It is not just that, unlike most Nazis, who, if not incarcerated for their crimes were at least forced from public life, many Japanese war criminals continued to occupy powerful positions in industry and government after the war. And it is not just the fact that while Germans have made repeated apologies to their Holocaust victims, the Japanese have enshrined their war criminals in Tokyo—an act that one American wartime victim of the Japanese has labeled politically equivalent to “erecting a cathedral for Hitler in the middle of Berlin.“
Add to the list, the fact that Japanese continue to censor information about these war crimes.
2.It is not well researched – it uses information from at least four different countries and as many languages from different means – witnesses accounts, photographs, video clippings, newspaper reports (including Japanese ones), personal diaries, confessions of some Japanese scholars themselves etc.
3.It uses only eye witnesses accounts – See 1. Above
4.It gives a one-sided account of the story – I’m sorry Japanese that ultra-nationalists didn’t get their voice but seriously Chang thinks that the Japanese soldiers involved in the acts were themselves victims of a system of oppression:
“Some Japanese scholars believe that the horrors of the Rape of Nanking and other outrages of the Sino-Japanese War were caused by a phenomenon called “the transfer of oppression.” According to Tanaka Yuki, author of Hidden Horrors: Japanese War Crimes in World War II, the modern Japanese army had great potential for brutality from the moment of its creation for two reasons: the arbitrary and cruel treatment that the military inflicted on its own officers and soldiers, and the hierarchical nature of Japanese society, in which status was dictated by proximity to the emperor. Before the invasion of Nanking, the Japanese military had subjected its own soldiers to endless humiliation. Japanese soldiers were forced to wash the underwear of officers or stand meekly while superiors slapped them until they streamed with blood. Using Orwellian language, the routine striking of Japanese soldiers, or bentatsu, was termed an “act of love” by the officers, and the violent discipline of the Japanese navy through tekken seisai, or “the iron fist,” was often called ai-no-muchi, or “whip of love.”
5.It is racist – On the contrary, she rejects any racist interpretations of the event.
“There are those who believe that the Japanese are uniquely sinister—a dangerous race of people who will never change. But after reading several file cabinets’ worth of documents on Japanese war crimes as well as accounts of ancient atrocities from the pantheon of world history, I would have to conclude that Japan’s behavior during World War II was less a product of dangerous people than of a dangerous government, in a vulnerable culture, in dangerous times, able to sell dangerous rationalizations to those whose human instincts told them otherwise. The Rape of Nanking should be perceived as a cautionary tale—an illustration of how easily human beings can be encouraged to allow their teenagers to be molded into efficient killing machines."
6. It criticises Japanese culture – I keep hearing this one in India too, but why is it even an argument? Why is something considered beyond criticism if it can be called ‘culture’ of any country? And any culture which promotes racist thinking kills compassion or excuses such meaningless violence is worth criticising. Chang is critical of the only military culture of Japan and not its other traditions.
And that kind of culture which asks people to get used to violence is detestable everywhere. Japan learned it from America and now China seems to have learned it too. And it will go on, when all over the world, the most progressive people see nothing wrong in letting their children play with toy-guns and violent video-games.
What is most disheartening is indifference the world is able could acquire. The whole world knew about Nanking just they know about the presently going genocide in Darfur and Rwanda. Or maybe we should learn to expect such behaviour - of forgetting the whole thing or putting a new UN resolution of 'never again' every time it happens.
Spoiler
(the images are same as in my review of a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13593961-of-africa" 'Of Africa' by Wole Soyinka)And you may think that nations are afraid of political action, but helping famine victims in
And soon, it will be Nigeria's turn.
To be honest, in a world where Trumps, Modis, Putins, Britexits are admired, where a US president, who is also a Nobel Peace laureate, refuses to apologise on behalf of his country for Heroshima and Nagasaki - calling them 'difficult decisions. I don't think Nigeria can hope for much.
Most people I meet tend to lovers of humanity - having a great faith in it, and what is the point in living if you have nothing higher to believe. That is why we all tend to think negatively of misanthropists - we want to disagree with Gulliver's conclusions who started feeling disgusted at his fellow-humans after his travels, I remember an interviewer showing his shock and refusing to believe that George Carlin was serious when later told him he didn't expect humanity to get any better - but I wonder whether it is a result of our ignorance or deliberate forgetfulness that we continue to hold on to this belief. Maybe it is a conclusion we must deny, we would never have had dreams if lying to oneself wasn't a part of living. Still it can't always be easy, there are people, I believe, who like Quentin, after he was disillusioned about Southern misogynist-racist culture, struggle to deny their hatred upon seeing this ugly face of humanity.
“I don't hate it he thought, panting in the cold air, the iron New England dark; I don't. I don't! I don't hate it! I don't hate it!”
kistireads's review against another edition
5.0
There is no way to give this book any less than 5 stars. The author did a huge service to the world.
I read the audiobook and the narration was truly excellent!
I read the audiobook and the narration was truly excellent!
meashleyfr's review against another edition
dark
emotional
informative
sad
slow-paced
3.75
Content Warnings
Graphic: War, Rape, and Violence
the_glendon's review against another edition
challenging
dark
informative
reflective
sad
medium-paced
3.75