JAPAN 1937 A STATE OF WAR

Only a peculiar madness could inspire the aspiration to carve up East Asia. For Japan’s generals and statesmen, however, this was imperative to create their world empire, even when it was totally unfeasible.

How far within a hostile country could an army of occupation travel before it became bogged down? How many soldiers, bullets, tanks, ships and planes would it take? What about the untold millions to be checked by a permanent garrison? And what of the risk of sanctions, of Western interference? None of these quibbles seems to have shaken the Imperial Japanese Army’s resolve as it set about fulfilling an ancient dream, but where this dream originated is hard to discern. What historians now refer to as the Second Sino-Japanese War is commonly overshadowed by the events after 1941. Not even its excesses and brutality caused too much alarm among the Great Powers – not until modern times, at least.

DREAMS OF AN EMPIRE

There once was a dream among the fighting men of Japan, whose tireless martial vigour mired their nation in endless civil war. It was a dream of boundless empire acquired by merciless brute force. In the last decade of the 16th century, the warlord Toyotomi Hideyoshi launched two campaigns to conquer the Korean peninsula. Once a foothold on the Asian mainland was established, his legions of Samurai and musketmen would then march on Peking and subsequently rule China.

Both endeavours were spectacular failures and Hideyoshi died soon after his last debacle. Japan closed its doors and outlawed its guns. Christian missionaries were expelled throughout the realm. Then, after 250 years of domestic peace and isolation, an American naval squadron would force Japan to accept free trade – a rude awakening for the complacent Tokugawa shogunate. By 1889, Japan had adopted a new constitution, modelled after Prussia’s, and became a constitutional monarchy.

A modern army soon followed. Six years later, the embers of Hideyoshi’s far-fetched dream were alight once more. The First Sino-Japanese War was a raw display of Japanese tenacity and firepower in the face of superior Chinese numbers. Humbled, the diplomats of the Qing Dynasty agreed to a humiliating peace deal in the Japanese city of Shimonoseki.

Not only did China lose the Korean peninsula for