I was suddenly in a panic that this terrifying disrespect for death and dying, this reversion in human social evolution, would be reduced to a footnote of history, treated like a harmless glitch in a computer program that might or might not again cause a problem, unless someone forced the world to remember it. [11] :10 Research [ edit ]

There are no official numbers for the death toll in the Nanjing Massacre, though estimates range from 200,000 to 300,000 people. Soon after the end of the war, Matsui and his lieutenant Tani Hisao were tried and convicted for war crimes by the International Military Tribunal for the Far East—both men were soon executed. Book review of The Rape of Nanking". University of the West of England. Archived from the original on 2008-12-11 . Retrieved 2007-07-23. Global Alliance for Preserving the History of WWII in Asia — a federation of NGOs whose mission was to educate the world about the unrecognized wartime horrors committed by Japan in the Pacific theaterKamen, Paula (2007). Finding Iris Chang: Friendship, Ambition, and the Loss of an Extraordinary Mind. Da Capo Press. ISBN 9780306817250. Chang wrote three books documenting the experiences of Chinese and Chinese Americans in history. Her first, Thread of the Silkworm (Basic Books, 1995) [8] tells the life story of the Chinese professor, Qian Xuesen (or Tsien Hsue-shen) during the Red Scare in the 1950s. Although Qian was one of the founders of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), and for many years helped the military of the United States debrief scientists from Nazi Germany, he was suddenly accused of being a spy and a member of the Communist Party USA, and was placed under house arrest from 1950 to 1955. Qian left for the People's Republic of China in September 1955. Upon his return to China, Qian developed the Dongfeng missile program, and later the Silkworm missile, which was used by the Iraqi military during its war on Iran and against the United States-led coalitions during the Persian Gulf War and the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

a b c Carvajal, Doreen (1999-05-20). "History's Shadow Foils Nanking Chronicle". The New York Times . Retrieved 2007-07-21. Chang spent two years on research for the book. [5] She found source materials in the US, including diaries, films, and photographs of missionaries, journalists, and military officers who were in Nanjing at the time of the massacre. [11] :11 Additionally, she traveled to Nanjing to interview survivors of the Nanjing Massacre and to read Chinese accounts and confessions by Japanese army veterans. [13] Also, she incorporated the most recent work on the subject by Chinese and Chinese-American historians by including many disturbing photographs and a myriad of translated documents. [14] Le viol de Nankin – 1937: un des plus grands massacres du XXe siècle. Payot. ISBN 978-2-228-90520-6.

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An American hero in Nanking". Asia Times. 2002-08-24. Archived from the original on 2002-08-26 . Retrieved 2007-07-27. {{ cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL ( link) Iris Chang received hate mail, death threats and academic scorn following her publication of The Rape of Nanking in 1997. Chang had spent considerable time and energy researching the book, hoping that her work could bring attention to a horrific time that seemed to somehow have been lost in the history books – a winter and spring of unimaginable horror in 1937 and 1938 following the Japanese capture and occupation of the Chinese city of Nanking. a b c d "Japan and the U.S.: Sidelining the Heterodox". Japan Policy Research Institute. December 2002. Archived from the original on 2004-03-23 . Retrieved 2007-07-22. The author presents her historical narrative from three perspectives: the Japanese soldiers who carried it out, the Chinese civilians and soldiers who endured it, and a group of Europeans and Americans who refused to abandon the city and the innocent victims. Through these perspectives, Chang provides the reader with important information and first-hand accounts of what actually happened. One of Chang’s ideas that stands out in my mind is that human beings are capable of the worst kind of inhuman behavior under certain circumstances. I find this argument to be of particular value because it can be used as an essential question or big idea for teaching World History students about genocide, a topic in the Virginia Modern World History curriculum which explores the motives for and effects of genocide. It can also provide a starting point for teaching about Japan’s militaristic culture and how it fostered in the Japanese soldier a total disregard for human life that led to other appalling atrocities during World War II. I can use sections from the book to provoke students to think about and reflect on the big idea. I could also assign students to research first-hand accounts from survivors and/or witnesses who were mentioned in Chang’s book to allow students to recognize and reflect on the various perspectives of the tragedy. Citing the phenomena of "transfer of oppression", she points out that the Japanese army possessed great potential for brutality from its very inception because of the brutality that Japanese officers exacted on their own soldiers, in an attempt to harden them. She further argues for social status as a source of power, but this did not successfully convince me that she, or anyone else for that matter, knows why there is such violence, so carefully organized, and so completely accepted by so many at one time.