By Vestnik Kavkaza
Ahead of his visit to Moscow on May 9th, President of China Xi Jinping told Russian media that China was the main theatre of war in Asia in World War II: “The Chinese people were the first to start fighting the Japanese militarists, were on the longest war-path, fought under the most difficult conditions, and just like Russia we had great numerous losses. The Chinese nation and Army persistently fought, destroying the enemy, and attracted huge contingents of Japanese aggressors. At the expense of a huge national loss – the lives of 35 million people – the Great Victory was achieved, and the great contribution to the victory in the world anti-fascist war was made.”
“After the First World War, during the 1920s, two centers of military danger were raised,” A senior researcher of the Research Institute (military history) of the Military Academy of the General Staff of the Russian Federation, Viktor Gavrilov, says. “One in Europe, after the arrival of Hitler in Germany, and there was another hotbed of danger in the Far East - Japanese militarism, which gathered momentum in 1931, as you know, the Japanese troops occupied Northeast China, Manchuria. Accordingly, then in Europe Hitler seized Austria, Czechoslovakia.”
However, in July 1937, there was an incident on a bridge in Lugoutsyao in which the Chinese incident began, as it was called in Japan. “Japan had not actually declared war on China, and to the end, it was called the Chinese accident, although it was a real full-scale war in the Far East,” Gavrilov says.
According to him, Abyssinia was seized by Italy in 1936. Ethiopians were killed by barbaric methods, including using poison gas. “And so, accordingly, these aggressors found each other. They were Germany, Italy and Japan. Their politics were the same, they came out of the League of Nations, so no one could prevent them from the political course which they were pursuing. In 1936, Germany and Japan concluded the Anti-Comintern Pact. Then, in 1940, this Anti-Comintern Pact was further developed, in 1940 the Triple Alliance was created, a Triple Alliance which defined the goals and objectives of the so-called fascist militarist bloc, which was gradually joined by other states in Europe,” the expert says.
According to him, “this fascist-militaristic bloc was comprised of 10 states, with a population of over 300 million people. It was a powerful force, a powerful force of aggression, which was preparing territorial conquests and planned to continue extending these territorial conquests. Germany attacked Poland, and Japan continued its activities in China by launching offensives and consistently capturing the territories of China.”
Today it is being actively discussed, including by Chinese historians, when World War II began - on September 1, 1939 or July 7, 1937, when Japan attacked China? In Russian historiography this point of view is also being discussed, and there are proponents of this version, as well as in China, that World War II started with the Japanese attack on China. Of course, there are certain nuances that must be considered, in particular the Chinese historians also say this, that all the same when it comes to the global nature of the war, the world, then it must be global in scope. And of course, World War II just swept the world after Germany's attack on Poland, because war was declared by France and Britain, which involved Canada, New Zealand and Australia. But other than that, of course, German submarines launched a war at sea against US ships. So, of course, there is the need to consider nuances, but nevertheless, of course, this issue requires debate and perhaps even a certain revision,” Gavrilov thinks.
