On the 18 of April 1942, 16 B-25 bombers were launched from the USS Hornet towards the Japanese archipelago. Led by Colonel James Doolittle, the Doolittle raid's purpose was twofold: retaliation for the Pearl Harbor attack four months prior, and instilling uncertainty into the Japanese populace., Although the physical damage caused by the raid was insignificant, its impact on American morale cannot be understated.,
What is often left out of the narrative, however, is the retaliatory campaign the Japanese would launch following the Doolittle raid. In the Zhejiang-Jiangxi region of China, around 250,000 civilians were massacred, property was destroyed wholesale, and deadly biochemical weapons were indiscriminately used., Despite its infrequent appearance in discourse regarding the Pacific War, I argue that the brutal Zhejiang-Jiangxi campaign following Chinese assistance for the Doolittle raid deserves being commemorated and discussed.
The history of Sino-American collaboration preceding direct US involvement can be traced back to the 1937 Marco Polo Bridge Incident. Prior to the incident, in spite of friendly relations with China and distaste for Japanese militarism, the US withheld support for the Chinese. The reasoning was threefold: First, fueled by the trauma of WWI and the economic downturn brought about by the Great Depression, the US had adopted an isolationist foreign policy. Second, the domestic squabbles between the Communist and Nationalist parties added a factor of uncertainty vis-à-vis the idea of transmitting aid. Third, the US had no strategic interests in China and feared provoking a Japanese response.
Despite this, in 1937, the Marco Polo Bridge incident and the sinking of a US gunboat, the USS Panay, by Japanese bombing attacks decisively turned public opinion pro-Chinese, On 27 September Japan would sign the Tripartite Pact, becoming an official member of the Axis.
In mid-1941, the American Volunteer Group, otherwise known as the “Flying Tigers” arrived in China and began offering informal assistance with the Chinese. Later in August, the US would enact a ban on oil exports to Japan, citing the reluctance of shipping oil to “aggressor countries.”, By December, the shortage of American imports would finally prompt an aggressive Japanese response with the Pearl Harbor attack on December 7, 1941, officially bringing the US into WWII. Nonetheless, having caught the allies off-guard, the Japanese would amass a sweeping empire stretching entirely across the pacific by spring of 1942.
In response to this, president Franklin D. Roosevelt, working together with his military advisors, decided upon an audacious plan. They planned to secretly send bombers directly to attack the Japanese mainland, without the protection of fighter aircraft. US aircraft at the time lacked the ability to serve as long distance escorts, thus, it would have been extremely risky to employ fighters available at the time. James Doolittle, an experienced flight instructor and test pilot, was chosen to lead the operation. Originally, he had suggested that the bombers land in Vladivostok, which would have shortened the flight distance by over 1,100 km, handing the aircraft to the Soviet Union afterwards. However, this was impossible, as the Japanese had signed a neutrality pact with the Soviets in 1941. It was then decided that the aircraft would land in China instead, due to the anticipated difficulty of landing on a moving aircraft carrier. The bombers would land first in airfields in the Zhejiang and Jiangxi provinces, refuel, then regroup in Chongqing.
Further complicating the operation, however, was that on the day of the operation, the naval task force had been spotted by a Japanese picket boat ahead of schedule. The fishing radioed Tokyo, notifying the military of a possible impending attack. Thus, despite being more than 300 miles farther away than the premeditated launch spot, the bombers had to be immediately released. Along the way, the bombers faced no opposition, and upon reaching Tokyo, met minimal resistance.
Following the successful attack upon Tokyo, Nagoya, Ōsaka, plus other minor targets, most of the raiders proceeded South towards the Chinese mainland. Though their intended destination was Chuchow (Quzhou), all except one aircraft crashed after running out of fuel.
Now, stranded in an active warzone in a foreign country, the airmen would turn to Chinese resistance fighters, who would play an important role ensuring the safe transportation of the crashed airmen deeper behind the frontlines. Of 75 airmen who landed in Chinese territory, 64 were rescued by civilians and guerilla fighters who offered medical assistance, meals, and led the way for the Americans.,
Despite this, the assistance received by the American airmen would incur a heavy toll upon the local inhabitants. Japan, infuriated by the boldness of the raid, would launch the Zhejiang-Jiangxi campaign on May 15th, less than a month later. While the official rationale for the offensive was to destroy Chinese air bases which would otherwise have threatened the Japanese mainland, the viciousness of this campaign speaks to an ulterior motive – retribution for the Doolittle raid. The Japanese, with some 180,000 men in total, advanced upon the provinces of Zhejiang and Jiangxi and occupied areas including Chuchow, Ihwang (Yihuang), Nancheng, and Yushan (see fig. 2).,
Aside from destroying the airbases, the Japanese also looted and razed down towns they happened across. As Father Wendelin Dunker, a priest residing in Ihwang described: “They shot any man, woman, child, cow, hog, or just about anything that moved, They raped any woman from the ages of 10-65.” In Chuchow, the Japanese began what can only be described as genocide, launching over 1,000 air raids, killing around 10,000 and displacing a further 30,000. In Yushan, over 80% of homes were destroyed. Punishments were especially severe for those discovered to have aided the raiders, with instances of civilians being forced to consume their own feces or being burned alive. In Nancheng, ten individuals were forced into the “bullet contest”, a sadistic game where the number of people the bullet passed through before being stopped was tested. In a cruel twist of fate, often, it was the little trinkets and gifts left by the Doolittle raiders as a show of gratitude that led to the identification of those who assisted the Americans.
Unit 731, the infamous Japanese biochemical weapons unit, likewise played a key role in the devastation. In Jinhua, the Japanese utilized vaporized versions of cholera, typhoid, bubonic plague, and dysentery, infecting wells and leaving contaminated foodstuffs for the inhabitants to find., Among the Japanese themselves, over 10,000 were infected and around 1,700 died of their infections., No records of the Chinese death toll exist due to the lack of health infrastructure, though, as one might imagine, it would have been a towering figure.
Having successfully captured and destroyed the enemy airfields, the Japanese would begin their withdrawal on August 15th, while being counterattacked by the Chinese army. By late September, they had ceded back nearly the entire zone-of-occupation and left behind a trail of destruction.
On one hand, it shows a moment when Japan’s aura of invincibility was shattered by international compatriotism. But on the other hand, we realize that hundreds of thousands of innocent lives were lost in horrific, brutal ways to an empire, angry and distraught. As Walter Cronkite, the famous broadcast journalist, once said, “In seeking truth, you have to get both sides of a story.”
It’s time we begin to take a look at the other side of the Doolittle raid – its cruel and tragic reprisal.
Appendix
Figure 1. Chinese Rescue Crashed Shangri-La Bombers. April 18, 1942. Photo, 17.9 x 22.9 cm. https://www.gilderlehrman.org/collection/glc0955311.
Figure 2. Map of rough areas occupied by the Imperial Japanese Army during the Zhejiang-Jiangxi campaign. (Map by author)
Figure 3. Madame Chiang Kai-Shek (Song Meiling) with Members of the Doolittle Raiders (Left to Right) James Doolittle, John Hilger, and Richard Cole. April 30, 1942. Photo. https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/hilger-john-allen-jack.
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