Editing Battle of Nanking (section)

==Prelude==
===China's defense preparations===
[[File:I-16_in_Nanking.PNG|thumb|A Soviet-made [[Polikarpov I-16|I-16]] fighter in the service of the [[Republic of China Air Force|ROCAF]] in Nanjing]]
Following the [[Mukden Incident|Manchurian Incident of 1931]], the Chinese government began a fast track national defense program with massive construction of primary and auxiliary air force bases around the capital of Nanjing including [[Jurong Airfield|Jurong Airbase]], completed in 1934, from which to facilitate aerial defense as well as launching counter-strikes against enemy incursions; on August 15, 1937, the [[Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service|IJN]] launched the first of many heavy ''schnellbomber'' (fast bomber) raids against Jurong Airbase using the advanced [[Mitsubishi G3M|G3Ms]] based upon [[Giulio Douhet]]'s blitz-attack concept in an attempt to neutralize the Chinese Air Force fighters guarding the capital city, but was severely repulsed by the unexpected heavy resistance and performance of the Chinese fighter pilots stationed at Jurong, and suffering almost 50% loss rate.<ref>{{Cite news |date=October 5, 2020 |title=88年前，镇江有一座"句容飞机场"，它的前世今生很传奇……_手机网易网 |url=https://3g.163.com/news/article_cambrian/FO6AVPJJ0521PJRE.html}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Chinese Air Force vs. The Empire of Japan |url=https://www.warbirdforum.com/cafhist.htm |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071102114835/http://www.warbirdforum.com/cafhist.htm |archive-date=November 2, 2007 |access-date=October 31, 2020}}</ref>
[[File:Aerial_shot_of_Nanking_city_wall_1930.jpg|thumb|Nanjing's stone city walls as photographed in 1930]]
On November 20 the Chinese Army and teams of conscripted laborers began to hurriedly bolster Nanjing's defenses both inside and outside the city.<ref name="jiken22" /><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Tokushi Kasahara |year=1992 |script-title=ja:南京防衛戦と中国軍 |journal=南京大虐殺の研究 |language=ja |location=Tokyo |publisher=Banseisha |pages=250–251 |editor=Tomio Hora |display-editors=et al}}. This source cites secret telegrams sent by General Tang Shengzhi.</ref> Nanjing itself was surrounded by formidable stone walls stretching almost {{convert|50|km|mi|abbr=off|sp=us|spell=in}} around the entire city.<ref>Hallett Abend, "Japanese Reach Nanking," ''The New York Times'', December 7, 1937, 1, 13.</ref> The walls, which had been constructed hundreds of years earlier during the [[Ming Dynasty]], rose up to {{convert|20|m|ft|abbr=off|sp=us|spell=in}} in height, were {{convert|9|m|ft|abbr=off|sp=us|spell=in}} thick, and had been studded with machine gun emplacements.<ref>F. Tillman Durdin, "Invaders Checked by Many Defenses in Nanking's Walls," ''The New York Times'', December 12, 1937, 1, 48.</ref> By December 6 all the gates into the city had been closed and then barricaded with an additional layer of sandbags and concrete {{convert|6|m|ft|abbr=off|sp=us|spell=in}} thick.<ref name="laststand22">F. Tillman Durdin, "Chinese Fight Foe Outside Nanking," ''The New York Times'', December 8, 1937, 1, 5.</ref><ref name="integer22">{{Cite book |last=Noboru Kojima |publisher=Bungei Shunju |year=1984 |location=Tokyo |pages=165–167 |language=ja |script-title=ja:日中戦争(3)}}; Kojima relied heavily on field diaries for his research.</ref>

Outside the walls a series of semicircular defense lines were constructed in the path of the Japanese advance, most notably an outer one about {{convert|16|km|mi|abbr=off|sp=us|spell=in}} from the city and an inner one directly outside the city known as the Fukuo Line, or multiple positions line.<ref name="dorn22">Frank Dorn, ''The Sino-Japanese War, 1937–41: From Marco Polo Bridge to Pearl Harbor'' (New York: Macmillan, 1974), 88–90.</ref><ref name="garrison22">David Askew, "Defending Nanking: An Examination of the Capital Garrison Forces," ''Sino-Japanese Studies'', April 15, 2003, 153–154. Here Askew cites American military officer Frank Dorn, journalist F. Tillman Durdin, and the research of the Japanese veterans' association Kaikosha.</ref><ref>"Nanking Prepares to Resist Attack," ''The New York Times'', December 1, 1937, 4.</ref> The Fukuo Line, a sprawling network of trenches, moats, barbed wire, mine fields, gun emplacements, and pillboxes, was to be the final defense line outside Nanjing's city walls. There were also two key high points of land on the Fukuo Line, the peaks of Zijinshan to the northeast and the plateau of Yuhuatai to the south, where fortification was especially dense.<ref name="jiken22" /><ref>{{Cite book |last=Noboru Kojima |publisher=Bungei Shunju |year=1984 |location=Tokyo |page=175 |language=ja |script-title=ja:日中戦争(3)}}; Kojima relied heavily on field diaries for his research.</ref><ref name="zijinshan22">{{Cite book |last=Yoshiaki Itakura |publisher=Nihon Tosho Kankokai |year=1999 |location=Tokyo |pages=77–78 |language=ja |script-title=ja:本当はこうだった南京事件}}</ref> In order to deny the Japanese invaders any shelter or supplies in this area, Tang adopted a strategy of [[scorched earth]] on December 7, ordering all homes and structures in the path of the Japanese within one to {{convert|2|km|mi|abbr=off|sp=us|spell=in}} of the city to be incinerated, as well as all homes and structures near roadways within {{convert|16|km|mi|abbr=off|sp=us|spell=in}} of the city.<ref name="jiken22" />

===China's forces===
The defending army, the Nanjing Garrison Force, was on paper a formidable army of thirteen divisions, including three elite [[Sino-German cooperation until 1941|German-trained]] divisions plus the super-elite [[Training Division (National Revolutionary Army)|Training Brigade]]. The reality was that nearly all of these units, save for the 2nd Army Group, had been severely mauled from the combat in Shanghai.<ref>David Askew, "Defending Nanking: An Examination of the Capital Garrison Forces," ''Sino-Japanese Studies'', April 15, 2003, 151–152.</ref><ref name="itakura22">{{Cite book |last=Yoshiaki Itakura |publisher=Nihon Tosho Kankokai |year=1999 |location=Tokyo |pages=78–80 |language=ja |script-title=ja:本当はこうだった南京事件}}</ref> By the time they reached Nanjing they were physically exhausted, low on equipment, and badly depleted in total troop strength. In order to replenish some of these units, 16,000 young men and teenagers from Nanjing and the rural villages surrounding it were speedily pressed into service as new recruits.<ref name="jiken22" /><ref name="force22">David Askew, "Defending Nanking: An Examination of the Capital Garrison Forces," ''Sino-Japanese Studies'', April 15, 2003, 163.</ref>
[[File:NH_77774.jpg|thumb|Chinese soldiers from one of the elite [[List of German-trained divisions of the National Revolutionary Army|German-trained divisions]] between Nanjing and Shanghai, November 26, 1937. Most wear the [[Stahlhelm|M35 Stahlhelm]]. One wears a German-style ski cap.]]
The German trained units, the 36th, [[87th Division (National Revolutionary Army)|87th]] and [[88th Division (National Revolutionary Army)|88th Divisions]], had each taken heavy casualties in Shanghai and saw their elite quality drop as a result. As of December, each division consisted of between 6,000 and 7,000 troops, of which roughly half were raw recruits.<ref name="Askew"/> In addition to these units, the defenders of Nanjing and the outside defensive lines were composed of four [[New Guangxi clique|Guangdong]] (Cantonese) divisions in the 66th and 83rd Corps, five divisions and two brigades from [[Sichuan]] in the 23rd Group Army, and two divisions from the [[National Revolutionary Army|NRA]] Central Army in the 74th Corps. Additional units were provided in by the [[Military police|Nanjing Gendarmerie]] and Nanjing Capital Garrison.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Harmsen |first=Peter |title=Nanjing 1937: Battle for a Doomed City |date=2015 |publisher=Casemate |pages=268–270}}</ref> However, most of these units had also suffered very high losses from the months of fighting in and around Shanghai. The 66th Corps had been reduced to half its original size, and its two divisions had to be reorganized into regiments.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Askew |first=David |date=2003 |title=Defending Nanking: An Examination of the Capital Garrison Forces |url=https://chinajapan.org/articles/15/askew15.148-173.pdf |journal=Sino-Japanese Studies |volume=15 |pages=155-156}}</ref> To replenish the Chinese garrison, 40,200 men from 44 supplementary battalions, 4 supplementary regiments, and 1 Jiangxi security regiment were sent towards the 36th division, 87th division, 88th division, 51st and 58th divisions of the 74th corps, and the Training Division of the Central Army.<ref>國史館檔案史料文物查詢系統，何應欽曹浩森代呈蔣中正遵辦調補南京各師補充團營等文電日報表，典藏號：002-080200-00487-040 [https://ahonline.drnh.gov.tw/index.php?act=Display/image/5658683xK=5gLm#82l]</ref> An additional 16,000-18,000 fresh soldiers were brought in from [[Hankou]] in the ranks of the 2nd Army, with 80% of their strength composed of recent recruits.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Li Junshan |publisher=Guoli Taiwan Daxue Zhuban Weiyuanhui |year=1992 |location=Taipei |pages=241–243 |language=zh-hant |script-title=zh:為政略殉: 論抗戰初期京滬地區作戰}}</ref> However, due to the unexpected rapidity of the Japanese advance, most of these new conscripts received only rudimentary training on how to fire their guns on their way to or upon their arrival at the frontlines.<ref name="jiken22" /><ref name="itakura22" />

No definitive statistics exist on how many soldiers the Nanjing Garrison Force had managed to cobble together by the time of the battle. [[Ikuhiko Hata]] estimates 100,000,<ref name="echo22">Ikuhiko Hata, "The Nanking Atrocities: Fact and Fable," ''Japan Echo'', August 1998, 51.</ref> and [[Tokushi Kasahara]] who argues in favor of about 150,000.<ref name="jiken22" /> The most reliable estimates are those of David Askew, who estimates via a unit-by-unit analysis a strength of 73,790 to 81,500 Chinese defenders in the city of Nanjing itself.<ref>David Askew, "Defending Nanking: An Examination of the Capital Garrison Forces," ''Sino-Japanese Studies'', April 15, 2003, 173.</ref> These numbers are backed up by the Nanking Garrison staff officer T'an Tao-p'ing, who records a garrison of 81,000 soldiers, a number which Masahiro Yamamoto argues to be one of the most probable figures.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Yamamoto |first=Masahiro |title=Nanking : Anatomy of an Atrocity |date=2000 |publisher=Praeger |pages=43}}</ref>

===Japanese mass bombings===
[[File:Nankinginfant2.jpg|right|thumb|A Chinese civilian carries his dying son wounded in a Japanese air raid on Nanjing.]]
[[File:Japanese_bombed_Nanjing_om_28_September_1937.jpg|thumb|The aftermath of a Japanese bombing raid on Nanjing]]
Even before the conclusion of the battle of Shanghai, Japan's [[Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service|Navy Air Service]] was launching frequent air raids on the city, eventually totaling 50 raids according to the Navy's own records.<ref name="bombing22">{{Cite book |last=Tokushi Kasahara |publisher=Iwanami Shoten |year=1997 |location=Tokyo |pages=17–18, 34, 40–41 |language=ja |script-title=ja:南京事件}}</ref> The [[Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service]] had struck Nanjing for the first time on August 15 with [[Mitsubishi G3M]] medium-heavy bombers, but suffered heavy losses in face of the aerial defense from [[Republic of China Air Force|Chinese Air Force]] Boeing P-26/281 Peashooter and [[Curtiss F11C|Hawk II]]/[[Curtiss BF2C Goshawk|Hawk III]] fighters based primarily at Jurong Airbase for the defense of Nanjing.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Wong Sun-sui |url=https://ww2db.com/person_bio.php?person_id=947}}</ref> It wasn't until after the introduction of the advanced [[Mitsubishi A5M]] fighter did the Japanese begin to turn the tide in air-to-air combat, and proceed with bombing both military and civilian targets day and night with increasing impunity as the Chinese Air Force losses mounted through continuous attrition; the Chinese did not have the aircraft industry nor comprehensive training regimen to replace men and machines to contend against the ever-growing and ever-improving Japanese war machine.<ref name="bombing22" />

However, experienced veteran fighter pilots of the Chinese Air Force still proved a danger against Japanese air power; [[Flying ace|combat aces]] [[Gao Zhihang|Col. Gao Zhihang]], [[John Wong Pan-yang|Maj. John Wong Pan-yang]] and [[:zh:刘粹刚|Capt. Liu Cuigang]] whom were outnumbered by the superior A5Ms entering Nanjing on October 12, shot down four A5M fighters that day, including Shotai leader W.O. Torakuma who was downed by Chinese fighter ace Col. Gao.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Chinese biplane fighter aces - Kao Chi-Hang |url=http://surfcity.kund.dalnet.se/china_kao.htm |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201009014225/http://surfcity.kund.dalnet.se/china_kao.htm |archive-date=October 9, 2020 |access-date=September 11, 2020}}</ref> Both Col. Gao and Capt. Liu died in non-aerial combat incidents by the following month as they were preparing to receive improved fighter aircraft design in the [[Polikarpov I-16|Polikarpov I-16s]].<ref>{{Cite web |title=Gao Zhihang |url=https://ww2db.com/person_bio.php?person_id=865 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201021161829/https://ww2db.com/person_bio.php?person_id=865 |archive-date=October 21, 2020 |access-date=September 11, 2020}}</ref>

=== Evacuation of Nanjing ===
In the face of Japanese terror bombing and the ongoing advance of the Imperial Japanese Army, the large majority of Nanjing's citizens fled the city, which by early December Nanjing's population had dropped from its former total of more than one million to less than 500,000, a figure which included Chinese refugees from rural villages burned down by their own government's scorched earth policies.<ref name="evacuation22">{{Cite book |last=Tokushi Kasahara |publisher=Iwanami Shoten |year=1997 |location=Tokyo |pages=31–32, 41 |language=ja |script-title=ja:南京事件}}</ref><ref>Masahiro Yamamoto, ''Nanking: Anatomy of an Atrocity'' (Westport, Connecticut: Praeger, 2000), 61–62.</ref> Most of those still in the city were very poor and had nowhere else to go.<ref name="evacuation22" /> Foreign residents of Nanjing were also repeatedly asked to leave the city which was becoming more and more chaotic under the strain of bombings, fires, looting by criminals, and electrical outages,<ref name="integer22" /><ref>[[Lily Abegg]], "Wie wir aus Nanking flüchteten: Die letzten Tage in der Haupstadt Chinas," ''Frankfurter Zeitung'', December 19, 1937, 9.</ref> but those few foreigners brave enough to stay behind strived to find a way to help the Chinese civilians who had been unable to leave.<ref name="askew22">David Askew, "Westerners in Occupied Nanking," in ''The Nanking Atrocity, 1937–38: Complicating the Picture'', ed. Bob Tadashi Wakabayashi (New York: Berghahn Books, 2008), 227–229.</ref> In late-November [[International Committee|a group]] of them led by German citizen [[John Rabe]] established the [[Nanking Safety Zone]] in the center of the city, a self-proclaimed demilitarized zone where civilian refugees could congregate in order to hopefully escape the fighting.<ref name="askew22" /> The safety zone was recognized by the Chinese government,<ref>Rana Mitter, ''Forgotten Ally: China's World War II'' (Boston: Hughton Mifflin Harcourt, 2013), 127–128. Mitter cites the diary of German civilian John Rabe.</ref> and on December 8 Tang Shengzhi demanded that all civilians evacuate there.<ref name="laststand22" />

Among those Chinese who did manage to escape Nanjing were Chiang Kai-shek and his wife [[Soong Mei-ling]], who had flown out of Nanjing on a private plane just before the crack of dawn on December 7.<ref name="TK22">{{Cite book |last=Tokushi Kasahara |publisher=Iwanami Shoten |year=1997 |location=Tokyo |pages=115–116 |language=ja |script-title=ja:南京事件}}</ref> The mayor of Nanjing and most of the municipal government left the same day, entrusting management of the city to the Nanjing Garrison Force.<ref name="TK22" />