China's War with Japan, 1937-1945 by Rana Mitter

Author:Rana Mitter [Unknown]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781846148040
Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
Published: 2013-05-07T07:00:00+00:00

Had he known of this positive assessment, Chiang Kai-shek would have valued it. China’s situation was precarious by the spring of 1940. In March high-level Japanese negotiators tried to secure an agreement with Chiang in Chongqing, while Wang Jingwei was attempting to formalize his own Nationalist government in Nanjing. This strategy, known in Chinese as the Tong Operation, and in Japanese as Operation Kiri, led to talks in Hong Kong between 7 and 10 March 1940. The Nationalists were in a perilous military position: the United States remained neutral, and Europe was in turmoil. In fact, during that spring, as the fall of France looked imminent, the British government similarly put out very discreet feelers to test the possibility of a negotiated peace with Germany. For China, there was no possibility of Western assistance. The Japanese saw it as a propitious moment to persuade Chiang to concede.21 Now, at a time of great danger for his government, Chiang opened the door to negotiations just a crack.

As a result, the Japanese continued to stall on recognition of the new government of Wang Jingwei. Throughout the summer and autumn of 1940, Japan remained ambivalent about the defector. Senior Japanese figures such as Count Arima Yoriyasu of the Privy Council declared that Wang’s behaviour proved his dishonesty, and Foreign Minister Matsuoka Yôsuke declared his continuing interest in an agreement with Chongqing.22 Zhou Fohai summed up the frustration of the defectors, who felt that they had made a supreme patriotic sacrifice: ‘Chongqing sees us as collaborators, we see ourselves as heroes. We think only peace can save the country – that’s why we think of ourselves as heroes. If we end up classed as heroes, then China and Japan will be at peace. If we end up classed as collaborators then China and Japan will never be at peace.’23

Senior Japanese military figures met with a Chinese intelligence agent posing as the younger brother of Chiang’s brother-in-law T. V. Soong. The talks foundered on issues of principle: Japan wanted to station troops in north China and gain formal recognition of Manchukuo, which Chiang absolutely refused. Japan responded by turning up the temperature. In June the Imperial Army captured the major city of Yichang in Hubei province. With Chongqing under continued pressure, talks resumed from 4 to 6 June, in Macau.24 In these talks the Japanese pressed for recognition of Manchukuo, and the placement of Japanese troops in north China, while the Chinese side continued to play for time, arguing that Tokyo’s final position was still not clear.

The Japanese also exploited the weakness of China’s potential European allies. Chiang’s government desperately needed supplies sent along the railway from the Indochinese port of Haiphong to Kunming in Yunnan province, nearly one thousand kilometres to the northwest. In January 1940, as Paris prepared itself for a German invasion, Japanese diplomats had sent messages to their French counterparts demanding that the colony’s railway be shut down. The Japanese repeatedly bombed the railway, and when the French ambassador in Tokyo

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