China torch relay: Nanjing

Rana Mitter Lecturer in modern Chinese history and politics, Oxford University

Nanjing holds solemn ceremonies in remembrance of its past

For foreigners, Nanjing is not yet one of the major tourist destinations of China.

Its attractions are not as famous as the Forbidden City in Beijing or the Terracotta Army in Xian. Yet for the visitors who do come, one particular place, a large concrete memorial in the outskirts of the city, is a must-see.

That site is the Memorial Museum of the Great Nanjing Massacre, an event still better known in the West by the title "the Rape of Nanking".

It commemorates one of the worst atrocities of World War II.

Over six long weeks between December 1937 and January 1938, troops of the Japanese Imperial Army captured Nanjing, then the Chinese capital, and killed, looted and raped in an orgy of destruction.

In the summer of 1937, the Japanese invasion of China had begun and, much to Tokyo's surprise, the Chinese armies had responded vigorously.

By the time the Japanese arrived at Nanjing, their soldiers were frustrated at the resistance they had encountered, and their behaviour was out of control.

Cultural centre

The precise number of victims remains hard to know exactly, and is the subject of political dispute.

CHINA RELAY CITIES IN FOCUS Use the map to see the full Olympic torch relay route or read about some of the key cities: Full route map, Hong Kong, Guangzhou, Xiamen, Jinggangshan, Shanghai, Nanjing, Huangshan, Three Gorges, Kaili, Lhasa, Urumqi, Xian, Yanji, Weihai, Qufu, Anyang, Beijing.

The official Chinese total is 300,000 dead, the highest number possible.

Revisionists on the Japanese extreme right try to argue that only a few thousand died, suggesting that the majority of the city's population must have fled before the Japanese army arrived.

Objective historians who have looked into the question rarely place the number of deaths below the tens of thousands.

But the numbers are not the main issue. No responsible commentator denies that a huge number of civilians were killed or raped in the events of winter 1937-38.

The destruction of Nanjing was particularly symbolic because of the city's importance in Chinese culture.

It had been the Chinese capital under the Ming dynasty and was always known as a centre of culture and learning. Even today, it has one of the highest concentrations of universities in the whole country.

Voices from Nanjing

It has also known great violence: the bloody Taiping War of the 1860s culminated in a battle at Nanjing in which hundreds of thousands died.

When Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek set up his government in 1928, he moved the capital back from Beijing to Nanjing, as he wanted to make the city a showcase for a modernised China.

If the Nationalists had stayed in office, they planned to rebuild the city with huge new boulevards and a government building that looked like a combination of the US Capitol and the Temple of Heaven in Beijing.

These dreams of a modern capital were shattered by the Japanese invasion. Chiang's government withdrew to the city of Chongqing in western China for the war period, and Nanjing was left exposed to Japanese invasion and occupation.

Awkward issue

Oddly, the Nanjing Massacre was not much discussed under Chairman Mao's period of rule (1949-1976) and there were few monuments recalling it in the city itself.

The massacre was less of an issue under Chairman Mao

The reason was geopolitical: Japan was no longer a threat to China after its defeat in 1945, and it made more sense for Mao's China to try to repair diplomatic relations with Tokyo while concentrating its rhetorical fire on Chiang Kai-shek, who still lay offshore on the island of Taiwan, plotting to retake the mainland from the Communists.

Besides, dwelling on the Nanjing Massacre would recall a time when China was weak and vulnerable: that was too much of a contrast with the strong and assertive idea of the country that Mao wanted to project.

The 1980s saw a shift in Beijing's strategy. It was now thought more important to put pressure on Japan, to encourage it to support China economically and diplomatically.

To encourage Tokyo to respond, the Chinese government finally allowed a more open internal discussion of events during World War II in China, including a much franker description of wartime atrocities.

In 1985, four decades after World War II ended, the Memorial Museum commemorating the greatest atrocity opened in Nanjing itself.

Built on the site of one of the major killing-grounds in 1937, glass-fronted cases let observers view the bones of those who died there.

Parties of schoolchildren, tourists, and war veterans troop around respectfully. A sign reminds people that this is a site for "patriotic education" and that they should be "respectful" in their behaviour. The site is there to create emotion as much as to record history.

Nanjing today is a city open to the world, as students from dozens of countries study there. It has also developed an important high-technology zone.

Yet today, it seems curious that the wrenching events of 1937-38 were the subject of official oblivion for so many decades, because the memory of the massacre has become central to the city's contemporary identity.

When the Olympic torch passes through the city, many citizens will consciously contrast the pride that they feel in China's growing status today and the terrible events that their country, and their own city, faced only a few decades ago.

The torch arrives in Nanjing on 27 May.

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