page_title: Iwane Matsui
section_title: At war in China, 1937–38
hierarchical_section_title: Iwane Matsui / At war in China, 1937–38
caption_attribution_description: English: Iwane Matsui inspecting the front in Shanghai in September of 1937
context_page_description: Iwane Matsui was a general in the Imperial Japanese Army and the commander of the expeditionary force sent to China in 1937. He was convicted of war crimes and executed by the Allies for his involvement in the Nanjing Massacre.
  Born in Nagoya, Matsui chose a military career and served in combat during the Russo-Japanese War. He volunteered for an overseas assignment there shortly after graduating from the Army War College in 1906. As Matsui rose through the ranks, he earned a reputation as the Japanese Army's foremost expert on China, and he was an ardent advocate of pan-Asianism. He played a key role in founding the influential Greater Asia Association.
  Matsui retired from active duty in 1935 but was called back into service in August 1937 at the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War to lead the Japanese forces engaged in the Battle of Shanghai. After winning the battle Matsui succeeded in convincing Japan's high command to advance on the Chinese capital city of Nanjing. The troops under his command who captured Nanjing on December 13 were responsible for the notorious Nanjing Massacre.
  Matsui finally retired from the army in 1938.
context_section_description: In July 1937, following the Marco Polo Bridge Incident, full-scale war broke out between Japan and China. Initially limited to northern China, the fighting spread in August to Shanghai. The Japanese government decided to send two divisions of reinforcements to drive the Chinese Army from Shanghai, which would be organized as the Shanghai Expeditionary Army (SEA). Due to a shortage of active duty generals, the Army General Staff opted to pull someone from the reserves to lead the new army and on August 15 Matsui was officially appointed commander of the SEA. The reason why Matsui was selected is not entirely clear, but his reputation as a "China expert" was likely a major factor. The historian Ikuhiko Hata argues that at the time the Army General Staff was hoping to seek a settlement with China once Shanghai had been secured for Japan, and Matsui, because of his close friendships with China's leaders, was seen as an ideal candidate to conduct the negotiations. Matsui declared that his mission would be "to make the Chinese people recognize that Japanese troops are the real friends of China", and likewise stated that "I am going to the front not to fight an enemy but in the state of mind of one who sets out to pacify his brother." However, one of his old acquaintances in the Chinese Army remarked in The New York Times, "There can be no friendship between us while there is war between China and Japan."
  While sailing to Shanghai Matsui adopted a plan drawn by the Japanese Navy to divide the SEA between two landing sites north of Shanghai, Wusong and Chuanshakou, and then use the former force to attack Shanghai directly and the latter force to encircle the Chinese Army. On August 23 Matsui oversaw the landing operation from aboard his flagship the Yura. The initial landings went well, but increasingly intense fighting ensued on land and casualties mounted. Matsui had never believed that he had been given enough soldiers to handle the job and was continuously pressing the high command for more reinforcements. He himself was not able to go ashore in Shanghai until September 10, but that was the same day on which the Army General Staff informed him that three additional divisions would be deployed under his command. Still, even this infusion of new troops proved insufficient to dislodge the Chinese. He had mistakenly judged at the beginning of October that the Chinese Army was about to withdraw from Shanghai and had ordered concentrated infantry charges on the Chinese positions in the expectation that the campaign would be wrapped up before November. In fact the SEA was still battering  Chinese defensive lines at Nanxiang and Suzhou Creek at that point. The turning point of the campaign did not come until November 5 when an entirely new army, the 10th Army led by Heisuke Yanagawa, landed south of Shanghai and forced the Chinese Army to make a hasty retreat. Shanghai had finally fallen by 26 November.
  The fighting also took a toll on Chinese civilians, and even at the height of the battle  Matsui took a special interest in the plight of Chinese refugees. In October he ordered that improvements be made to living conditions in Chinese refugee camps and later he made a large personal donation of $10,000 to the French humanitarian Father Jacquinot to help him in establishing a "safety zone" for Chinese civilians in Shanghai.
caption: Matsui inspecting the front lines in Shanghai in September 1937
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