Nanking : Anatomy of an Atrocity
Editorial Reviews
Review
“The historical landscape is undergoing a curious change. A new genre has sprouted, [taking] the form of short books on dramatic events they focus on an incident, relate it as a story, and then follow its repercussions through the social order....They pose dizzying questions: How can we know what actually happened? Where is the truth to be found among competing interpretations? Many of the incidents concern the blackest aspects of the twentieth century. The massacre of defenseless civilians during their occupation of Nanking illustrates this tendency....Nanking: The Anatomy of an Atrocity by Masahiro Yamamoto shows how the debate about [these] events has continued to reverberate through Japanese society. Yamamoto attempted to arrive at an accurate assessment of the scale of the massacre....That estimate discredited revisionists, who claimed that virtually no atrocities had occurred, but it fell far short of the more standard view.”–
“[T]his work is a significant contribution. Yamamoto argues that without "clarification of the truth," there is "no way to determine in what way the Japanese...should be held responsible." His careful, dispassionate analysis of evidence, added to his refusal to embrace either the deniers or the outraged, may make us uncomfortable, but it does move us toward clarity.”–
“[T]his is an excellent study...Yamamoto has affected scholarly assessments of the Sino-Japanese War.”–
Book Description
The December 1937 incident that has come to be known as the Rape of Nanking is, without doubt, a tragedy that will not soon be forgotten. While acknowledging that a tremendous loss of life occurred, this study challenges the current prevailing notion that the incident was a deliberate, planned effort on the part of the Japanese military and analyzes events to produce an accurate estimate of the scale of the atrocities. Drawing on Chinese, Japanese, and English sources, Yamamoto determines that what happened at Nanking were unfortunate atrocities of conventional war with precedents in both Eastern and Western military history. He concludes that post-war events such as the war crimes trials and the impact of the Holocaust in Europe affected public opinion regarding Nanking and led to a dramatic reinterpretation of events.
Nanking : Anatomy of an Atrocity
Nanking : Anatomy of an Atrocity,Masahiro Yamamoto,Praeger Publishers,0275969045,Asia - China,Asia - Japan,History,History - General History,History: World,Japan - History - 20th Century,Military - General,Military - Other,Military History - Modern,Nanjing (Jiangsu Sheng, China),Nanking Massacre, Nanjing, Jia,Nanking Massacre, Nanjing, Jiangsu Sheng, China, 1937,History / Military / General
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