In Rana Mitter's tense, moving and hugely important book, the war between China and Japan - one of the most important struggles of the Second World War - at last gets the masterly history it deserves.

A history of the Chinese experience in WWII, named a Book of the Year by both the Economist and the Financial Times: “Superb” (The New York Times Book Review). In 1937, two years before Hitler invaded Poland, Chinese troops clashed with Japanese occupiers in the first battle of World War II. Joining with the United States, the Soviet Union, and Great Britain, China became the fourth great ally in a devastating struggle for its very survival. In this book, prize-winning historian Rana Mitter unfurls China’s drama of invasion, resistance, slaughter, and political intrigue as never before. Based on groundbreaking research, this gripping narrative focuses on a handful of unforgettable characters, including Chiang Kai-shek, Mao Zedong, and Chiang’s American chief of staff, “Vinegar Joe” Stilwell—and also recounts the sacrifice and resilience of everyday Chinese people through the horrors of bombings, famines, and the infamous Rape of Nanking. More than any other twentieth-century event, World War II was crucial in shaping China’s worldview, making Forgotten Ally both a definitive work of history and an indispensable guide to today’s China and its relationship with the West.

In Rana Mitter's tense, moving and hugely important book, the war between China and Japan - one of the most important struggles of the Second World War - at last gets the masterly history it deserves Different countries give different opening dates for the period of the Second World War, but perhaps the most compelling is 1937, when the 'Marco Polo Bridge Incident' plunged China and Japan into a conflict of extraordinary duration and ferocity - a war which would result in many millions of deaths and completely reshape East Asia in ways which we continue to confront today. With great vividness and narrative drive Rana Mitter's new book draws on a huge range of new sources to recreate this terrible conflict. He writes both about the major leaders (Chiang Kaishek, Mao Zedong and Wang Jingwei) and about the ordinary people swept up by terrible times. Mitter puts at the heart of our understanding of the Second World War that it was Japan's failure to defeat China which was the key dynamic for what happened in Asia. Reviews: 'A remarkable story, told with humanity and intelligence; all historians of the second world war will be in Mitter's debt ... [he] explores this complex politics with remarkable clarity and economy ... No one could ask for a better guide than Mitter to how [the rise of modern China] began in the cauldron of the Chinese war' Richard Overy, Guardian 'Rana Mitter's history of the Sino-Japanese War is not only a very important book, it also has a wonderful clarity of thought and prose which make it a pleasure to read' Antony Beevor 'The best study of China's war with Japan written in any language ... comprehensive, thoroughly based on research, and totally non-partisan. Above all, the book presents a moving account of the Chinese people's incredible suffering ... A must read for anyone interested in the origins of China's contribution to the making of today's world' Akira Iriye About the author: Rana Mitter is Professor of the History and Politics of Modern China at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of St Cross College. He is the author of A Bitter Revolution: China's Struggle with the Modern World. He is a regular presenter of Night Waves on Radio 3.

"China's Bitter Victory" is a comprehensive analysis of China's epochal war with Japan. Striving for a holistic understanding of China's wartime experience, the contributors examine developments in the Nationalist, communist, and Japanese-occupied areas of the country. More than just a history of battles and conferences, the book portrays the significant impact of the war on every dimension of Chinese life, including politics, the economy, culture, legal affairs, and science. For within the overriding struggle for national survival, the competition for political goals continued. China ultimately triumphed, but at a price of between 15 and 20 million lives and vast destruction of property and resources. And China's bitter victory brought new trials for the Chinese people in the form of civil war and revolution. This book tells the story of China during a crucial period pregnant with consequences not only for China but also for Asia and the world as well. Addressed to students, scholars, and general readers, the book aims to fill a gap in the existing literature on modern Chinese history and on World War II.

This pictorial history of the Sino-Japanese War offers a rare look at one of the most important yet neglected aspects of WWII. The 1937-1945 war between China and Japan was one of the most bitter conflicts of the twentieth century. It was a struggle between the two dominant peoples of Asia. Millions of soldiers fought on each side and millions of soldiers and civilians died. Philip Jowett's book is one of the first photographic histories of this devastating confrontation. Using a selection of almost 200 historic photographs, he traces the course of the entire war from the Japanese invasion and the retreat of the Chinese armies and their refusal to surrender, to the involvement of the Americans and the eventual Japanese defeat in 1945. Jowett’s graphic account is an absorbing introduction to this often-overlooked theatre of the Second World War. The images show the armies on all sides and the weaponry and equipment they used. But they also record the experience of the troops, Chinese and Japanese, and of the Chinese civilians who suffered terribly through eight years of war.

This project offers the first English-language general history of military operations during the Sino-Japanese war based on Japanese, Chinese, and Western sources.

This book describes, in vivid detail, the history of the Japanese invasion and occupation and of different parts of China, from the viewpoints of scholars in China, Japan, and the West

A Foreign Affairs Book of the Year A Spectator Book of the Year “Insightful...a deft, textured work of intellectual history.” —Foreign Affairs “A timely insight into how memories and ideas about the second world war play a hugely important role in conceptualizations about the past and the present in contemporary China.” —Peter Frankopan, The Spectator For most of its history, China frowned on public discussion of the war against Japan. But as the country has grown more powerful, a wide-ranging reassessment of the war years has been central to new confidence abroad and mounting nationalism at home. Encouraged by reforms under Deng Xiaoping, Chinese scholars began to examine the long-taboo Guomindang war effort, and to investigate collaboration with the Japanese and China’s role in the post-war global order. Today museums, television shows, magazines, and social media present the war as a founding myth for an ascendant China that emerges as victor rather than victim. One narrative positions Beijing as creator and protector of the international order—a virtuous system that many in China now believe to be under threat from the United States. China’s radical reassessment of its own past is a new founding myth for a nation that sees itself as destined to shape the world. “A detailed and fascinating account of how the Chinese leadership’s strategy has evolved across eras...At its most interesting when probing Beijing’s motives for undertaking such an ambitious retooling of its past.” —Wall Street Journal “The range of evidence that Mitter marshals is impressive. The argument he makes about war, memory, and the international order is...original.” —The Economist