Question

Give the reasons as to why Japan invaded China.

Answer 1

Hint: China and Japan fought the Second Sino-Japanese war . The war started in 1937 and continued up to 1945. In China, this war was referred to as the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression.

Complete answer: China was impoverished and economically weak when it got engaged with Japan in the Second Sino-Japanese war in 1931. In 1928, Chiang Kai Shek founded the Nationalist Government known as the Kuomintang. Mao Tse Tung’s Chinese Communist Party opposed this, This resulted in the civil war in China between the Communists and the Nationalists in 1930. Seeing the weakness inside, Japan took this opportunity and attacked China in order to harness its resources. They occupied Manchuria. This area was made into an independent state known as Manchukuo and was ruled by a Chinese emperor who was a puppet in the hands of the Japanese.
China appealed to the League of Nations who only condemned the Japanese actions. As a result, the Japanese Delegates stepped outside the League of nations in rage and never returned. From their Manchurian base, the Japanese continued to intrude China. The north of China was almost taken over. The Kuomintang (KMT) planned to destroy both the internal and external forces, the Communists and the Japanese. In the infamous fall of the Nankin, the Japanese troops killed 3,000,000 civilians and raped 80,000 women. The Chinese Communist Party and the KMT had fought hard. With the bombing of Pearl Harbour by the USA in 1939, Japan became a part of the First World War. Its troops had weakened and hence they lost the Second-Sino Chinese war.

Note: As a result of this war, the Chinese people began to support the Communist Party. It caused the fall of Chiang Kai’s empire more rapidly. The Second Sino Japanese war constituted almost 50 per cent of casualties of the Pacific war if the period from 1937-41 is included.