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The contents of this site are direct quotes, translations, or abridged versions of scholarly works by Japanese historians or researchers. |
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"60 Major Methods of Execution" |
Iris Chang charges in her book that the Japanese soldiers in Nanking murdered Chinese in barbaric and gruesome ways.
Japanese historians say that such charges stem from wartime hostile propaganda, possibly easily believed by the Chinese public even if such scenes were never actually witnessed, because they were precisely the ways in which Chinese often killed each other throughout their history, including this period. Many Chinese had suffered such fates at the hands of fellow Chinese, and the average man or woman knew next-to -nothing about Japanese culture. Such people make easy prey to Chinese propaganda.
Historian Nakamura Akira cites the "60 major methods of execution" of the Chinese Communist Party, implemented against opponents, as a modern example of the historic tradition of brutal violence.
The Communists killed opponents by 1) frying them alive, 2) driving nails into their bodies, 3) cut off ears and gouge out the eyes, 4) skinning the faces alive, 5)cut the bodies open while alive and pull out the internal organs, 6) pierce a rope through the nose and pull the victims around, and the list goes on.
Of these, methods 3), 4), 5), 6) were actually implemented against Japanese civilians and soldiers in Chinan in May of 1928 and in Tongzhou in July of 1937.
Such methods of killing people have been alien to Japanese culture and imagination historically.
| Source : Nakamura Akira, Dai Toa Sensou heno Michi , (Tokyo: Tendensha, 1990), p.456d |