On 15 August 1945 China's long nightmare came to an end. Two weeks later, in Tokyo Bay, Japan signed the Instrument of Surrender.
Seeking raw materials to fuel its growing industries, Japan invaded the Chinese province of Manchuria in 1931. By 1937 Japan controlled large sections of China, and war crimes against the Chinese became commonplace.
The surrender of the Empire of Japan in World War II was announced by Emperor Hirohito on 15 August and formally signed on 2 September 1945, bringing the war's hostilities to a close.
1 assigned responsibility for demobilising Japanese forces in three areas, China, Indochina, and Formosa, to Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek. On 9 September 1945, pursuant to the General Order, Japanese commanders in China and representatives of Generalissimo Chiang signed the Act of Surrender – China Theatre in Nanking.
The conflict is often termed the second Sino-Japanese War, and known in China as the War of Resistance to Japan. There are arguments that the conflict began with the invasion of Manchuria in 1931, but between 1937 and 1945, China and Japan were at total war.
Firstly Japan simply did not have the manpower and resources to occupy all of China. Even in the territories she had Japan usually stuck to the major cities and rail hubs. Japan even needed collaborator troops just to hold onto this.
It dominated the northern cities of China, controlled the puppet state of Manchuria, administered Taiwan, and ruled the prosperous southern port cities. Japan had possession of roughly 25% of China's enormous territory and more than a third of its entire population.
Although foreign observers had predicted an easy victory for the more massive Chinese forces, the Japanese had done a more successful job of modernizing, and they were better equipped and prepared. Japanese troops scored quick and overwhelming victories on both land and sea.
Japan formally surrendered on 2 September 1945, following the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. China was recognized as one of the Big Four Allies during the war, regained all territories lost to Japan, and became one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council.
On November 25, 1936, a month after Germany and Italy entered into a treaty of friendship, Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan signed the Anti-Comintern Pact. In this pact, the two countries pledged mutual assistance in combating the threat posed by the Communist International.
Japan had the best army, navy, and air force in the Far East. In addition to trained manpower and modern weapons, Japan had in the mandated islands a string of naval and air bases ideally located for an advance to the south.
One of Japan's main goals during World War II was to remove the United States as a Pacific power in order to gain territory in east Asia and the southwest Pacific islands.
Japan's first encounter with Western colonialism was with Portugal in the mid-sixteenth century. The Portuguese brought Catholicism and the new technology of gun and gunpowder into Japan. The latter changed the way samurai rulers fought wars, and accelerated the process of national unification.
Was China colonized by any country? Yes, China was colonized directly by Britain, Portugal, Russia, and China. Many other countries had control over trade in much of China.
The Japanese murdered 30 million civilians while "liberating" what it called the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere from colonial rule. About 23 million of these were ethnic Chinese. It is a crime that in sheer numbers is far greater than the Nazi Holocaust. In Germany, Holocaust denial is a crime.
Since the end of World War II, Sino-Japanese relations are still mired with geopolitical disagreements. The enmity between these two countries emanated from the history of the Japanese war and the imperialism and maritime disputes in the East China Sea.
That count includes hundreds of thousands of deaths due to drowning, disease and starvation after the Chinese nationalist army breached massive holes in dikes holding back the Yellow River to stymie the Japanese advance in 1938.
Russia lost the Russo-Japanese War due to the Japanese superiority in the sea. Japan had naval superiority; they used this military strategy to defeat the Russians even though Japan was considered inferior to Russia.
As Japan contributed a remarkable 16 percent to global GDP growth from 1960-1990, China added a mere 2 percent. Much has changed. China has overtaken Japan as the world's second largest economy, accounting for 16 percent of global GDP in 2015 (see Figure 1).
The island was annexed in 1683 by the Qing dynasty of China and ceded to the Empire of Japan in 1895. The Republic of China, which had overthrown the Qing in 1911, took control of Taiwan following the surrender of Japan in 1945. Japan would renounce sovereignty over Taiwan in 1952.
Japan took Europe's lead, creating colonies of its own in Korea, Taiwan, and China, and becoming an imperial power by the twentieth century, eventually allying itself with Nazi Germany during World War II.
China Lost World War II.
1950: Korean War
Soon after the start of the Korean War, General Douglas MacArthur led U.S. forces across the 38th Parallel and drove north towards China, which brought China into the conflict and precipitated the first military clash between U.S. and Chinese forces since the Boxer Uprising of 1900.
To be clear, China could not have won the war on its own. The defeat of Japan was dependent on western, and in particular, American finance, military support and supplies (although western ground troops did not fight in China).