Editing Nanjing Massacre (section)

== Evidence collection ==
The Japanese either destroyed or concealed important documents, severely reducing the amount of evidence available for confiscation. Between the declaration of a ceasefire on August 15, 1945, and the arrival of American troops in Japan on August 28, "the Japanese military and civil authorities systematically destroyed military, naval, and
government archives, much of which was from the period 1942–1945".<ref name="auto2">{{cite book |title=Researching Japanese War Crimes |publisher=National Archives and Records Administration for the Nazi Warcrimes and Japanese Imperial Government Records Interagency Working Group |date=2006 |url=https://www.archives.gov/files/iwg/japanese-war-crimes/introductory-essays.pdf |page=9 |last=Drea |first=Edward |archive-date=March 3, 2016 |access-date=July 22, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160303190336/http://www.archives.gov/iwg/japanese-war-crimes/introductory-essays.pdf |url-status=live}}</ref> Overseas troops in the Pacific and East Asia were ordered to destroy incriminating evidence of war crimes.<ref name="auto2" /> Approximately 70 percent of the Japanese army's wartime records were destroyed.<ref name="auto2" /> In regards to the Nanjing Massacre, Japanese authorities deliberately concealed wartime records, eluding confiscation from American authorities.<ref name="auto4">{{cite book |title=Researching Japanese War Crimes |publisher=National Archives and Records Administration for the Nazi Warcrimes and Japanese Imperial Government Records Interagency Working Group |url=https://www.archives.gov/files/iwg/japanese-war-crimes/introductory-essays.pdf |date=2006 |page=10 |last=Drea |first=Edward |archive-date=March 3, 2016 |access-date=July 22, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160303190336/http://www.archives.gov/iwg/japanese-war-crimes/introductory-essays.pdf |url-status=live}}</ref> Some of the concealed information was made public a few decades later. For example, a two-volume collection of military documents related to the Nanjing operations was published in 1989; and disturbing excerpts from [[Kesago Nakajima]]'s diary, a commander at Nanjing, was published in the early 1980s.<ref name="auto4" />

According to American historian [[Edward J. Drea]]:<blockquote>While the Germans, beginning in 1943, did engage in substantial efforts to obliterate evidence of such crimes as mass murder, and they destroyed a great deal of potentially incriminating records in 1945, a great deal survived, in part because not each one of the multiple copies had been burned. The situation was different in Japan. Between the announcement of a ceasefire on August 15, 1945, and the arrival of small advance parties of American troops in Japan on August 28, Japanese military and civil authorities systematically destroyed military, naval, and government archives, much of which was from the period 1942–1945. Imperial General Headquarters in Tokyo dispatched enciphered messages to field commands throughout the Pacific and East Asia ordering units to burn incriminating evidence of war crimes,
especially offenses against prisoners of war.<ref name="auto1">{{cite book |last=Drea |first=Edward |url=https://www.archives.gov/files/iwg/japanese-war-crimes/introductory-essays.pdf |title=Researching Japanese War Crimes |date=2006 |publisher=National Archives and Records Administration for the Nazi Warcrimes and Japanese Imperial Government Records Interagency Working Group |page=9 |access-date=July 22, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160303190336/http://www.archives.gov/iwg/japanese-war-crimes/introductory-essays.pdf |archive-date=March 3, 2016 |url-status=live}}</ref></blockquote>

According to Yang Daqing, professor of History and International Affairs at [[George Washington University]]:

<blockquote>While it is standard practice for governments to destroy evidence in times of defeat, in the two weeks before the Allies arrived in Japan, various Japanese agencies—the military in particular—systematically destroyed sensitive documents to a degree perhaps unprecedented in history. Estimates of the impact of the destruction vary. Tanaka Hiromi, a professor at Japan’s National Defense Academy who has conducted extensive research into remaining Imperial Japanese Army and Navy documents in Japan and overseas, claims that less than 0.1 percent of the material ordered for destruction survived.<ref>{{cite book |last=Drea |first=Edward |url=https://www.archives.gov/files/iwg/japanese-war-crimes/introductory-essays.pdf |title=Researching Japanese War Crimes |date=2006 |publisher=National Archives and Records Administration for the Nazi Warcrimes and Japanese Imperial Government Records Interagency Working Group |page=21 |access-date=2022-07-22 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160303190336/http://www.archives.gov/iwg/japanese-war-crimes/introductory-essays.pdf |archive-date=2016-03-03 |url-status=live}}</ref></blockquote>

In 2003, the director of Japan's Military History Archives of National Institute for Defense Studies said that as much 70 percent of Japan's wartime records were destroyed.<ref name="auto1" />

During his time in China, [[Bernhard Arp Sindberg]], an amateur photographer and friend to several foreign journalists, always had his camera with him, taking graphic photos of the civilian massacres and extensive destruction.<ref name=":9">{{Cite web |title=Bernhard Arp Sindberg: An Inventory of His Papers and Photography Collection at the Harry Ransom Center |url=https://norman.hrc.utexas.edu/fasearch/findingAid.cfm?eadid=01295# |access-date=May 29, 2024 |website=norman.hrc.utexas.edu}}</ref> Sindberg smuggled the unprocessed film out of China with the help of his company and had entrusted the development of the film to his colleagues. After the war, he retrieved his photos, producing one of the few photographic records documenting the Nanjing massacre.<ref name=":9" />

Ono Kenji, a chemical worker in Japan, procured a collection of wartime diaries from Japanese veterans who fought in the Battle of Nanking in 1937.<ref name="Drea 2006 28">{{cite book |title=Researching Japanese War Crimes |publisher=National Archives and Records Administration for the Nazi Warcrimes and Japanese Imperial Government Records Interagency Working Group |url=https://www.archives.gov/files/iwg/japanese-war-crimes/introductory-essays.pdf |date=2006 |page=28 |last=Drea |first=Edward |archive-date=March 3, 2016 |access-date=July 22, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160303190336/http://www.archives.gov/iwg/japanese-war-crimes/introductory-essays.pdf |url-status=live}}</ref> In 1994, nearly 20 diaries in his collection were published, which became an important source of evidence for the massacre. Official war journals and diaries were also published by [[Kaikosha]], an organization of retired Japanese military veterans.<ref name="Drea 2006 28" />

In 1984, in an attempt to refute accusations of Japanese war crimes in Nanjing, Kaikosha, the Japanese Army Veterans Association, interviewed former Japanese soldiers who had served in the Nanjing area from 1937 to 1938. Instead of refuting the massacre, the interviewed veterans confirmed that a massacre had taken place and openly described and admitted to taking part in the atrocities. In 1985, the interviews were published in the association's magazine, ''Kaiko'', along with an admission and apology that read, "Whatever the severity of war or special circumstances of war psychology, we just lose words faced with this mass illegal killing. As those who are related to the prewar military, we simply apologize deeply to the people of China. It was truly a regrettable act of barbarity."<ref name="Kingston">Kingston, Jeff. March 1, 2014. "[http://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2014/03/01/commentary/japans-reactionaries-waging-culture-war/#.UxMH8o1WF9A Japan's reactionaries waging culture war] {{Webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210116034251/http://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2014/03/01/commentary/japans-reactionaries-waging-culture-war/#.UxMH8o1WF9A |date=2021-01-16 }}." ''[[Japan Times]]''.</ref>

In early 1980s, after interviewing Chinese survivors and reviewing Japanese records, Japanese journalist [[Honda Katsuichi]] concluded that the Nanjing Massacre was not an isolated case, and that Japanese atrocities against the Chinese were common throughout the Lower [[Yangtze River]] since the [[battle of Shanghai]].<ref name=":11">{{cite book |title=Researching Japanese War Crimes |publisher=National Archives and Records Administration for the Nazi Warcrimes and Japanese Imperial Government Records Interagency Working Group |url=https://www.archives.gov/files/iwg/japanese-war-crimes/introductory-essays.pdf |date=2006 |page=x |last=Drea |first=Edward |access-date=July 22, 2022 |archive-date=March 3, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160303190336/http://www.archives.gov/iwg/japanese-war-crimes/introductory-essays.pdf |url-status=live}}</ref> The diaries of other Japanese combatants and medics who fought in China have corroborated his conclusions.<ref>{{cite book |title=Researching Japanese War Crimes |publisher=National Archives and Records Administration for the Nazi Warcrimes and Japanese Imperial Government Records Interagency Working Group |url=https://www.archives.gov/files/iwg/japanese-war-crimes/introductory-essays.pdf |date=2006 |page=x |last=Drea |first=Edward |access-date=July 22, 2022 |archive-date=March 3, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160303190336/http://www.archives.gov/iwg/japanese-war-crimes/introductory-essays.pdf |url-status=live}}</ref>