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Whose War? One year later, General Seishiro Itagaki, arch extremist of the Japanese army, who had become Minister of War, could have claimed that the Japanese had for all practical purposes won their war: they had bitten off the five northern provinces as planned. But the Japanese had found that they were not fighting their war. They were fighting Chiang's war and they had still to win it.
Instead of suing for peace, Chiang retreated, drawing the Japanese Army farther and farther into China's mammoth interior, imitating after a fashion the strategy by which the Russians ruined Napoleon in 1812.
The Japanese still do not dare declare an end to the undeclared war, for such a declaration would mean great loss of Face.
They must first suppress the Man, Chiang, who has spoiled their plans. Even if they could get him they might not bring an end to Chinese resistance. Chinese national consciousness is becoming a hardy plant, and there are now other good Chinese generals, notably Li Tsung-jen and Pai Chung-hsi of the crack Kwangsi army, who might carry on. But the death of Chiang might mean a short period of struggle for power within China. With such a struggle for power going on, Japan could terminate hostilities without loss of Face.
Lopsided as were the military odds, the invasion of China has been no mediocre war like the conquest of Ethiopia. The number of men engaged was more than twice that of the late Civil War in Spain.
The casualties can only be guessed at, but they have been huge — even among the Japanese, who have had to fight General Plague, General Flood, and General Attrition. The Japanese sack of Nanking will go down in history as the greatest mass sexual orgy of modern times — thousands of women and girls were assaulted to top off the mass execution of thousands of civilians. The fall of Canton last October was equally extraordinary: fearful that the story of Nanking would be repeated, Canton's 860,000 residents virtually abandoned the city within a few hours of the Japanese arrival — probably the greatest spontaneous civilian evacuation in history.
In battle, the Japanese, who have modern guns and a vastly superior air force, have won most of the direct engagements with ease. The most successful Chinese tactic is the "scorched earth" policy, which prevents the Japanese from living off the country through which they advance. But in spite of scorched earth and burned buildings, the Japanese have seized the cities and important railroads of North China, and have pushed their lines up the Yangtze valley to Hankow. Japan's conquest at its furthest limits extends 1,000 miles from north to south, 1,000 miles from east to west.