Editing Nanjing Massacre (section)

=== Debate in Japan ===

David Askew, formerly an associate professor at [[Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University]], noted that in Japan views concerning the massacre were divided between two mutually exclusive groups. The "Great Massacre School" group accepts the findings of the Tokyo Trials, and concludes that there were at least 200,000 casualties and at least 20,000 rape cases; whereas "The Illusion School" group rejects the tribunal's findings as "victor's justice". According to Askew, the "Great Massacre School" is more sophisticated, and the credibility of its conclusions are supported by a large number of authoritative academics.<ref name="auto5">{{cite web |url=http://www.japanesestudies.org.uk/articles/Askew.html |title=The Nanjing Incident: Recent Research and Trends |date=April 4, 2002 |access-date=October 20, 2004 |archive-date=April 5, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180405031715/http://www.japanesestudies.org.uk/articles/Askew.html |url-status=live}}</ref> Askew estimates that the city's population was 224,500 from December 24, 1937, to January 5, 1938.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Askew |first=David |date=March 2001 |title=The Nanjing Incident: An Examination of the Civilian Population |url=https://chinajapan.org/articles/13.2/13.2askew2-20.pdf |journal=Sino-Japanese Studies |volume=13 |issue=2 |page=2 |archive-date=May 31, 2024 |access-date=May 31, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240531162056/https://chinajapan.org/articles/13.2/13.2askew2-20.pdf |url-status=live}}</ref>

Hora Tomio, a Japanese history professor at [[Waseda University]], published a book in 1967 following his 1966 visit to China, devoting a third of the book to the massacre.<ref>{{cite journal |title=A SINO-JAPANESE CONTROVERSY: THE NANJING ATROCITY AS HISTORY |first=Daqing |url=https://chinajapan.org/articles/03.1/03.1.14-35yang.pdf |last=Yang |journal=Sino-Japanese Studies |page=18}}</ref> During the 1970s, [[Katsuichi Honda]] wrote a series of articles for the ''[[Asahi Shimbun]]'' on war crimes committed by Japanese soldiers during World War II (such as the Nanjing Massacre).<ref>{{cite journal |first=Katsuich |last=Honda |title=Chūgoku no Tabi" (中国の旅), "Travels in China" |journal=[[Asahi Shimbun]]}}</ref> In response, Shichihei Yamamoto, using the [[pen name]] "Isaiah Ben-Dasan", wrote an article that denied the massacre, and [[Akira Suzuki (writer)|Akira Suzuki]] published a book that denied the massacre.<ref name="daqingyang2">{{cite journal |title=A SINO-JAPANESE CONTROVERSY: THE NANJING ATROCITY AS HISTORY |first=Daqing |url=https://chinajapan.org/articles/03.1/03.1.14-35yang.pdf |last=Yang |journal=Sino-Japanese Studies |page=20 |archive-date=March 9, 2023 |access-date=June 7, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230309191845/https://chinajapan.org/articles/03.1/03.1.14-35yang.pdf |url-status=live}}</ref> However, the debate was short-lived because no denialist produced a study that was as comprehensive as the one conducted by Hora.<ref name=daqingyang2 /> The opposition was unable to present enough evidence to deny the massacre.<ref name=daqingyang2 />

There are disputes about the official death toll of the massacre. This estimate includes an estimation that the Japanese Army murdered 57,418 Chinese POWs at Mufushan, though the latest research indicates that between 4,000 and 20,000 were massacred,<ref name="Yamamoto M. 2000">Masahiro Yamamoto, Nanking: Anatomy of an Atrocity (Westport, Connecticut: Praeger, 2000), p. 193.</ref><ref>Ono Kenji, "Massacre Near Mufushan," in The Nanking Atrocity, 1937–38: Complicating the Picture, ed. Bob Tadashi Wakabayashi (New York: Berghahn Books, 2008), p. 85.</ref> and it also includes the 112,266 corpses apparently buried by the Chongshantang, a charitable association, though today some historians argue that the Chongshantang's records were at least greatly exaggerated if not entirely fabricated.<ref>Masahiro Yamamoto, Nanking: Anatomy of an Atrocity (Westport, Connecticut: Praeger, 2000), 112.</ref><ref name="consensus1" /><ref>David Askew, "The Scale of Japanese Atrocities in Nanjing: An Examination of the Burial Records," Ritsumeikan Journal of Asia Pacific Studies, June 2004, 7–10.</ref> According to Bob Wakabayashi, he estimates the death toll within [[Nanjing City Wall]] to be around 40,000, mostly massacred in the first five days; while the total victims after a 3-month period in Nanjing and its surrounding six rural counties "far exceed 100,000 but fall short of 200,000".<ref name="Askew 2002" /> Wakabayashi concludes that estimates of over 200,000 are not credible.<ref name="consensus1">Bob Tadashi Wakabayashi, "Leftover Problems," in The Nanking Atrocity, 1937–38: Complicating the Picture, ed. Bob Tadashi Wakabayashi (New York: Berghahn Books, 2008), 382–384.</ref>