When Tigers Fight: The Story of the Sino-Japanese War, 1937-1945

by Dick Wilson

Narrative of the Sino-Japanese war of 1937-1945.

Genres: History, China, World War II

304 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1982

Reviews

[Chris Watson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an old book, but it's very hard to find *anything* on this topic - the War between Japan and China from 1937 to 1945.
It explodes the falsehoods expressed by the incompetent and braggardly General Stillwell, and presents a factual and engaging account of this substantial and terrible conflict.
China was a massively important theatre during WWII, not to mention of huge importance to later 20th Century historical events. This story should be better known.

[John · Rating 3 out of 5]

so far seems a good book for ignorant lay-people like me trying to fill in huge gaps in what went on in other parts of the world. Lots of maps -this helps- plus brisk narrative & attention to broad sweep o' stuff going on at the time....

[Stephen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Before plunging into the abyss of hubris and attempting to claim the entire Pacific as its own in 1941, the Empire of Japan was hard at work attempting to enlarge itself at the expense of its 'elderly, doddering brother', China. China was, in the 1930s, in a weak state: riddled with outside colonies and barely unified after a period of feudal civil war, its only defense against Japan's increasing aggression being sheer size and numbers. After reviewing the early stages of Japanese intervention in China, which included taking over Germany's colonial interests and asserting its own after the Great War, Wilson uses the Marco Polo Bridge incident as the start of the war and delivers a straightforward military history, concluding in the epilogue that the Sino-Japanese war was a complete waste for both sides. China was ravaged, falling into the hands of an internal dictator, and would not emerge onto the global stage for decades thereafter -- while Japan would, astonishingly, bounce back as a commercial titan.

Before large-scale combat actually began, Japan had effectively annexed a portion of northern China, Manchuria, and placed a surviving member of the Chinese nobility there as their puppet. The armed conflict assumed an air of self-perpetuation escalation, as these things do, and soon Japan's goal was the complete military subordination of China. Its early attacks seized Beijing, in the north, and Shanghai in the south. (The infamous Nanjing sadism followed Shanghai.) From there, Japan labored to link its spheres of power, resulting in numerous battles in the mountains and vast expanses between the two cities. China's Nationalist leaders were able to augment their meager defenses with men and material from the west: not just the United States and Great Britain, but Germany and Russia as well. One of the more interesting tidbits exposed in this book is that Hitler struggled to rid the army of its anti-Japanese types, so while Bavarian's most famous mediocre painter was looking for alliance with Tokyo, other German elements were supporting the Rising Sun's scorched victims!) Once Hitler plunged into his foolhardy invasion of Russia, Japan felt free to seize Anglo, Dutch, and American East-Pacific holdings and thus began a separate campaign for Burma, which lay between British India and the Japanese empire in China. After a retreat, the Allies returned in a year to reclaim the territory, and by that time Japan was being slowly pushed back by the US Navy and Marines. Even as it was driven into defeat, the somnolent internal war in China between Nationalists and Communists became much more active.

For me, this was only the beginning in trying to get a handle on the Chinese side of the war. It seems like a good outline, and Wilson doesn't skip over important aspects like China's guerrilla warfare or the utter horror the war let loose in China: both from the brutal behavior of the invading army to the grim measures the Nationalists resorted to, like flooding the country to stymie a Japanese offense but killing and displacing thousands in the bargain.




Related:
Forgotten Ally: China's WW2, Rana Mitter
The Rape of Nanking, Iris Chang

[Dave Franklin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Dick Wilson’s “When Tigers Fight,” is a workmanlike history of the Sino-Japanese War, 1937-1945. In the 1930s, China could reasonably be described as a failed state: foreign colonies controlled various ‘possessions,’ warlords vied for fiefdoms, and Japan's insatiable militarists increasingly viewed Chlna as low hanging fruit to be plucked aggressively. John Paton Davies, a U.S. Foreign Service office, best summed up the contemporary Chinese scene as “a huge and seductive practical joke, which defeated the Westerners who tried to modernize it, the Japanese who tried to conquer it, the Americans who tried to democratize and unify it- and Chiang and Mao.”

Wilson describes the nascent Japanese interventions in China following the Great War, and then takes the Marco Polo Bridge incident as the starting point of the Sino-Japanese war. China was ravaged, a fact unbeknownst to most in the West . Its wartime sufferings were second only to those experienced by the U.S.S.R. Modern Chinese historians estimate that 25 to 50 million Chinese may have perished in the war. Massacre, destruction, rape, torture, and starvation were staples of the Chinese diet.

Prior to pronounced hostilities, Japan had effectively annexed Manchuria, creating the puppet state of Manchukuo. Eventually, Japan's war objectives transmogrified: Clausewitzian realpolitik gave way to a perverse East Asian version of Gotterdammerung which included the complete military subordination of China. Early attacks seized Beijing, in the north, and Shanghai in the south, from which the rape of Nanjing ensued. Japan struggled to link its spheres of power, and, as Wilson aptly relates, the occupation resembled a taut clothesline, which offered the conquerors little of practical military value. The resulting expanses between areas of occupation opened Japan’s forces to the scourge of partisan warfare, and further brutalized soldiers and civilians alike. In short, Japan began to resemble ‘a fly on flypaper,’ struggling to free a leg, but sinking ever deeper into the glue.

Wilson’s treatment of Chiang Kai-shek is, to say the least, overly sympathetic. A ruthless adventurer; Chiang was part-Nationalist, part-Fascist, part-feudal warlord. Wilson’s treatment downplays Chiang’s dysfunctional Neptocracy, and rationalizes much of the ineptitude surrounding his regime. Contrariwise, Wilson has little use for Gen.Joseph Stilwell, Chiang’s acerbic chief of staff. In fact, Wilson glosses over the irreconcilable issue which divided Stilwell and Chiang: the former’s desire to defeat the Japanese, and the latter’s desire to enhance his political viability at any cost. The irascible Stilwell was not alone in experiencing the maddening cloud cuckoo land which informed Chinese Nationalist decision making. British Field Marshal Harold Alexander queried General Du, Chiang’s commander in Burma, about Du’s refusal to employ his field guns. Du replied, when pressed, that if he were to lose his guns, his army would no longer be considered China’s best. But, unlike Stilwell, Alexander absorbed such blather with stoicism.


Wilson concludes by highlighting the tragedy of the entire episode. Both nations were bled white, Japan’s China policy was instrumental for the demise of its east Asian ambitions. Mao’s ascent can be directly tied to Japan’s anti-communist intervention, absent the war, Mao would have continued his obscure, protracted struggle in northwest China. The war exposed Chiang’s indifference to the plight of the Chinese people. The war allowed the media to shine its klieg lights on his regime, and the regime was found wanting.

That said, Wilson’s book, while a good primer; however, it displays a number of flaws. The author utilizes pinyin translations without referencing the Wade- Giles nomenclature employed in many earlier treatments of the period. In addition, Wilson’s narrative falls victim to the same problem which Mao aptly ascribed to Japan’s experience. “China,” Mao said, “is like a gallon jug which Japan is trying to fill with half a pint of fluid.” The author cannot begin to cover the scope of this conflict in its entirety, nor can he afford to ignore important, but seemingly disparate events. The resulting book is readable, yet somewhat disjointed. Nevertheless, in view of current events, Wilson’s account of this momentous occurrence is well worth reading.

[Steven Raszewski · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a fascinating and little known (especially in the west) history. The similarities between the German Russian campaign and the Japanese China campaign are so uncanny. Yet it seems the only thing the Germans learned from the Japanese were the unbelievable brutality and cruelty towards civilians.