Editing Nanjing Massacre (section)

== War crimes tribunals ==
Shortly after the surrender of Japan, the primary officers in charge of the Japanese troops at Nanjing were put on trial. General Matsui was indicted before the [[International Military Tribunal for the Far East]] for "deliberately and recklessly" ignoring his legal duty "to take adequate steps to secure the observance and prevent breaches" of the [[Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907|Hague Convention]].

Other Japanese military leaders in charge at the time of the Nanjing Massacre were not tried. [[Prince Kan'in Kotohito]], chief of staff of the Imperial Japanese Army during the massacre, had died before the end of the war in May 1945. Prince Asaka was granted immunity because of his status as a member of the imperial family.<ref>[[Herbert Bix]], ''[[Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan]]'', 2000, p. 583<!--ISSN/ISBN, publisher needed--></ref><ref>[[John W. Dower]], ''[[Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II]]'', 1999, p. 326.<!--ISSN/ISBN, publisher needed--></ref> [[Isamu Chō]], the aide to Prince Asaka, and whom some historians believe issued the "kill all captives" memo, had committed ''[[seppuku]]'' (ritual suicide) during the [[Battle of Okinawa]].<ref>Thomas M. Huber, ''Japan's Battle of Okinawa, April–June 1945'', Leavenworth Papers Number 18, Combat Studies Institute, 1990, p. 47<!--ISSN/ISBN needed--></ref>

<gallery class="center" caption="" widths="150px" heights="150px" perrow="3">
File:International Military Tribunal Ichigaya Court.jpg|The [[International Military Tribunal for the Far East]] was convened at "Ichigaya Court," formally Imperial Japanese Army HQ building in [[Ichigaya]], [[Tokyo]].
File:Iwane Matsui.jpg|General [[Iwane Matsui]]<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.history.gr.jp/~koa_kan_non/16-4.html |title=「松井石根研究会」の必要性について |work=history.gr.jp |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110721122627/http://www.history.gr.jp/~koa_kan_non/16-4.html |archive-date=July 21, 2011}}</ref>
File:Tani Hisao.jpg|General [[Hisao Tani]]<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.people.com.cn/media/200112/12/NewsMedia_147412.jpg |access-date=March 26, 2009 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100218182317/http://www.people.com.cn/media/200112/12/NewsMedia_147412.jpg |archive-date=February 18, 2010 |title=Hisao Tani}}</ref></gallery>

=== Grant of immunity to Prince Asaka ===
On May 1, 1946, [[Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers|SCAP]] officials interrogated [[Prince Asaka]], who was the ranking officer in the city at the height of the atrocities, about his involvement in the Nanjing Massacre and the deposition was submitted to the International Prosecution Section of the Tokyo tribunal. Asaka denied the existence of any massacre and claimed never to have received complaints about the conduct of his troops.<ref>Awaya Kentarô, Yoshida Yutaka, ''Kokusai kensatsukyoku jinmonchôsho'', dai 8 kan, Nihon Tosho Centâ, 1993., Case 44, pp. 358–366.</ref>

=== Evidence and testimony ===
[[File:Nanking telegram Harold John Timperley.gif|thumb|[[Harold John Timperley]]'s telegram of January 17, 1938, describing the atrocities]]

The prosecution began the Nanjing phase of its case in July 1946. Dr. [[Robert O. Wilson]], a surgeon and a member of the International Committee for the Nanking Safety Zone, testified.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://imtfe.law.virginia.edu/contributors/robert-o-wilson |title=Robert O. Wilson |access-date=March 6, 2024 |archive-date=February 27, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240227140608/http://imtfe.law.virginia.edu/contributors/robert-o-wilson |url-status=live}}</ref>
Other members of the International Committee for the Nanking Safety Zone who took the witness stand included [[Miner Searle Bates]]<ref>{{cite web |url=https://web.library.yale.edu/divinity/nanking/bates |title=Miner Searle Bates &#124; Yale University Library |access-date=March 6, 2024 |archive-date=May 25, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240525082128/https://web.library.yale.edu/divinity/nanking/bates |url-status=live}}</ref> and [[John Magee (missionary)|John Magee]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Zhang |first=Kaiyuan |title=Eyewitnesses to Massacre |year=2015 |publisher=Routledge |location=New York |isbn=978-0-7656-0685-3 |url=https://api.pageplace.de/preview/DT0400.9781317470724_A24854418/preview-9781317470724_A24854418.pdf |page=x |archive-date=April 16, 2024 |access-date=March 6, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240416192700/https://api.pageplace.de/preview/DT0400.9781317470724_A24854418/preview-9781317470724_A24854418.pdf |url-status=live}}</ref> [[George A. Fitch]],<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1979/01/23/archives/george-a-fitch-dies-worked-for-ymca-in-china-for-decades.html |title=George A. Witch Dies; Worked for Y.M.C.A. In China for Decades |work=The New York Times |date=January 23, 1979 |last1=Cook |first1=Joan |archive-date=September 12, 2024 |access-date=March 6, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240912151901/https://www.nytimes.com/1979/01/23/archives/george-a-fitch-dies-worked-for-ymca-in-china-for-decades.html |url-status=live}}</ref> [[Lewis S. C. Smythe]],<ref>{{cite web |url=https://imtfe.law.virginia.edu/subject-45?page=11 |title=Atrocities |access-date=March 6, 2024 |archive-date=July 23, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240723042303/https://imtfe.law.virginia.edu/subject-45?page=11 |url-status=live}}</ref> and James McCallum filed affidavits with their diaries and letters.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://web.library.yale.edu/divinity/nanking/mccallum |title=James Henry McCallum &#124; Yale University Library |access-date=March 6, 2024 |archive-date=November 14, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231114024835/https://web.library.yale.edu/divinity/nanking/mccallum |url-status=live}}</ref>

The entry for the same day in Matsui's diary read, "I could only feel sadness and responsibility today, which has been overwhelmingly piercing my heart. This is caused by the Army's misbehaviors after the fall of Nanjing and failure to proceed with the autonomous government and other political plans."<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Lu |first=Suping |date=2013 |title=The Nanjing Massacre: Primary Source Records and Secondary Interpretations—A Textual Critique of Bob Tadashi Wakabayashi's Review |journal=China Review International |volume=20 |issue=3/4 |pages=259–282 |jstor=43818315 |issn=1069-5834}}</ref>

=== Matsui's defense ===
{{one source|section|date=June 2016}}
Matsui asserted that he had never ordered the execution of Chinese [[POWs]]. He further argued that he had directed his army division commanders to discipline their troops for criminal acts, and was not responsible for their failure to carry out his directives. At trial, Matsui went out of his way to protect [[Prince Asaka]] by shifting blame to lower-ranking division commanders.<ref name="Bix">{{cite journal |first=Herbert |last=Bix |title=Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan |url=https://archive.org/details/hirohitomakingmo00bixh |url-access=limited |journal=Perennial |year=2001 |page=[https://archive.org/details/hirohitomakingmo00bixh/page/n754 734] |isbn=978-0-06-093130-8}}</ref>

=== Verdict ===
[[Kōki Hirota]], Prime Minister of Japan at an earlier stage of the war, and a diplomat during the atrocities at Nanjing, was convicted of participating in "the formulation or execution of a common plan or conspiracy" (count 1), waging "a war of aggression and a war in violation of international laws, treaties, agreements and assurances against the Republic of China" (count 27) and count 55. Matsui was convicted by a majority of the judges at the Tokyo tribunal who ruled that he bore ultimate responsibility for the "orgy of crime" at Nanjing because, "He did nothing, or nothing effective, to abate these horrors."
<blockquote>Organized and wholesale murder of male civilians was conducted with the apparent sanction of the commanders on the pretext that Chinese soldiers had removed their uniforms and were mingling with the population. Groups of Chinese civilians were formed, bound with their hands behind their backs, and marched outside the walls of the city where they were killed in groups by machine gun fire and with bayonets. — From Judgment of the International Military Tribunal</blockquote>

=== Sentences ===
On November 12, 1948, Matsui and Hirota, along with five other convicted Class-A war criminals, were sentenced to death by hanging. Eighteen others received lesser sentences. The death sentence imposed on Hirota, a six-to-five decision by the eleven judges, shocked the general public and prompted a petition on his behalf, which soon gathered over 300,000 signatures but did not succeed in commuting the Minister's sentence. All of them were hanged on December 23, 1948.<ref>{{cite book |last=Dower |first=John |author-link=John W. Dower |title=Embracing defeat: Japan in the wake of World War II |year=2000 |publisher=Norton |location=New York |isbn=978-0-393-32027-5 |page=459 |edition=Paperback}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Brackman |first=Arnold C. |title=The other Nuremberg: the untold story of the Tokyo war trials |year=1988 |publisher=Quill |location=New York |isbn=0-688-07957-1 |page=395}}</ref>

=== Other trials ===
[[Hisao Tani]], a lieutenant general for the 6th Division of the Imperial Japanese Army, was tried by the [[Nanjing War Crimes Tribunal]] in China.<ref name="Bix" /> He was found guilty of war crimes, sentenced to death, and executed by shooting on April 26, 1947. However, according to historian Tokushi Kasahara, the evidence used to convict Hisao Tani was not convincing.<ref name="auto3">{{cite journal |last=Yang |first=Daqing |date=June 1999 |title=Convergence or Divergence? Recent Historical Writings on the Rape of Nanjing |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2650991 |journal=The Journal of Japanese Studies |volume=104 |issue=3 |page=857 |jstor=2650991 |pmid=19291890}}</ref> Kasahara said that if there was a full investigation of the massacre, many other high ranking authorities, which include higher level commanders, army leaders and emperor [[Hirohito]], could have been implicated.<ref name="auto3" />

In 1947, Toshiaki Mukai and Tsuyoshi Noda, the two officers responsible for the contest to kill 100 people, were both arrested and extradited to China. They were also tried by the Nanjing War Crimes Tribunal. On trial with them was Gunkichi Tanaka, a captain from the 6th Division who personally killed over 300 Chinese POWs and civilians with his sword during the massacre. All three men were found guilty of war crimes and sentenced to death. They were [[executed by shooting]] together on January 28, 1948.<ref>国防部审判战犯军事法庭对战犯向井敏明等人的判决书. 民国史档案资料丛书—侵华日军南京大屠杀档案. 1947年12月18日: pp. 616–621.</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Sheng |first=Zhang |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HrJIEAAAQBAJ&dq=Gunkichi+Tanaka+300&pg=PT442 |title=The Rape of Nanking: A Historical Study |date=November 8, 2021 |publisher=Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG |isbn=978-3-11-065289-5 |access-date=September 24, 2022 |archive-date=September 23, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230923141942/https://books.google.com/books?id=HrJIEAAAQBAJ&dq=Gunkichi+Tanaka+300&pg=PT442 |url-status=live}}</ref>

[[Moritake Tanabe]], the Chief of Staff of the [[Tenth Army (Japan)|Japanese 10th Army]] at the time of the massacre, was tried for unrelated war crimes in the [[Dutch East Indies]]. He was sentenced to death and executed in 1949.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Biography of Lieutenant-General Moritake Tanabe – (田辺盛武) – (たなべ もりたけ) (1889–1949), Japan |url=https://www.generals.dk/general/Tanabe/Moritake/Japan.html |access-date=September 19, 2022 |website=www.generals.dk |archive-date=September 23, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230923142417/https://www.generals.dk/general/Tanabe/Moritake/Japan.html |url-status=live}}</ref>