# Why Don't Japanese People Acknowledge the Nanjing Massacre?

Contrary to the common stereotype among most Chinese netizens, the Japanese don't fundamentally deny it—they're actually impatient with it; as perpetrators, they feel China's response is like Xianglin's wife endlessly complaining.

If you killed a wild boar for food and its piglet came to your dreams accusing you of cruelty, would you feel guilty?

Some might, but most would just find it annoying and mock those who developed compassion.

That's the mentality of most Japanese, especially Japanese right-wingers.

In Japanese eyes, early 20th-century China was just another wild boar waiting for slaughter.

Regarding the history from the late Edo period to the Meiji Restoration and the "Sino-Japanese War," Japanese textbooks conveyed this worldview:

To counter Western oppression, Japan must become strong, and the prerequisite for strength is to "borrow" some resources from neighbors.

And we're not borrowing for nothing—once I lead East Asia to victory in the "holy war" against the West, the entire "Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere" will benefit.

To put it plainly, conquering China was just an appetizer in their ridiculous plan.

They were so arrogant they thought they could subjugate all of China and the Korean Peninsula as a hinterland in a few quick moves. The notions of "conquering China in three months" and "eight corners under one roof" were direct manifestations of this worldview.

So in their eyes, the war criminals enshrined in Yasukuni Shrine are genuinely "guardian national heroes"—without them, there would be no Japanese future.

But is this actually true?

In reality: Since the Meiji period, Japanese have consistently lacked one crucial capability—population control, maintenance, and management. This characteristic runs through their entire history.

First, the most fundamental error: without regard for domestic food security and sustainable development requirements, they allowed their population to explode and double in a short period, forcing them to depend on import-export trade to solve basic food problems.

From that point on, Japanese society entered a state where "population is a negative asset"—in simple terms, human life became cheaper than grass.

In the Japanese military at that time, the idea that "an ordinary farmer's life is worthless" was utterly commonplace, and as for the lives of invaded Chinese people, they were worth even less.

Second, they underestimated Western military technological power, had blind faith in linear development and "might makes right," and immediately upon becoming an industrial nation fantasized about developing overseas colonies like Western powers, prematurely overextended military-industrial capacity, and wrongly implemented brutal Spartan-style education.

This also resulted in a large proportion of Japanese soldiers having serious psychological problems. From childhood they received fanatically extreme militaristic education; many compassionate and humane children took their own lives under this terrifyingly oppressive environment.

Actually, calling it "militaristic education" gives it too much credit—Japanese middle schools were essentially legalized versions of bullying behavior found in the Korean military.

Finally, and most seriously, they completely underestimated the management difficulty of colonizing 400 million people on Chinese territory, the logistical supply difficulty of long battle lines.

This final error directly caused the Nanjing Massacre, and explains the cruel killings Japanese committed elsewhere: unable to manage so many prisoners of war, so many people, they simply killed them.

All the high-sounding rhetoric like "Japan had no choice but to expand externally" and "Japan was also a victim under the iron heels of imperialist powers" are just fig leaves to deflect their own contradictions, obscuring this fact:

Japan was the worst-organized, most incompetent, most arrogantly self-aggrandizing nouveau riche industrial power of the early 20th century; the aggressive behavior of such a nation could never possess much strategic wisdom.

An army raised by such a nation could never maintain strict military discipline or unquestioning obedience.

Japanese soldiers who returned from committing atrocities overseas are not national heroes—they're just a bunch of murderers and rapists who tasted blood, and whenever no one is watching, they'll do the same things to their own compatriots.

In their completely self-rationalizing worldview, the Nanjing Massacre was merely a "mistake," not a crime.

They feel they too are wronged victims, merely wanting to "strengthen themselves," yet ended up with this outcome.

It has a certain "beautiful, strong, and tragic protagonist" quality of self-pity.

But what many Japanese refuse to acknowledge is that the fundamental motive for their invasion was simply squandering surplus population and military-industrial capacity they didn't need.

Once Japanese population declined to levels they could actually manage properly, all that talk of "eight corners under one roof" seemed far less urgent.

The role they played in history was merely that of a damp, incompetent supporting character who liked to huff and puff—nothing elegant about it.

And so you understand: the words most likely to pierce the hearts of Japanese people who deny the facts of the Nanjing Massacre are these:

You were never a destiny-chosen nation one step away from representing East Asia—just a lucky gambling dog. Now you're reverting to your deserved ecological niche.

You never had any right to wage so-called holy war between East and West. That privilege belongs to China.

China will win this war with complete integrity and dignity, forcing you to witness your own absurdity, madness, and ridiculousness.

The rest, let time tell. Your nation has no shortage of spineless converts fervent in their faith.