Economic Review Of Japanese Occupation Of China

[Richard Stone]

The attached article is a post war review of the economics aspects of the Japanese occupation of the areas of China that came under its control.

The article is based on the post war documents that were available up to late 1949. Therefore the report’s findings may not agree with subsequent analysis that used documents that became available later.

The article was printed in the March 1950 edition of the USA professional military reference magazine ‘Military Review’.

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[Kriegswirtschaft]

I believe most of the statistis used in this review are biased or simply wrong. China did not provide with such large raw materials as otherwise claimed. And from the economic point of view the full occupation and war was a financial liability.

I have not seen the figures for the Occupation of China but for Manchuria there are some modern review that summarise from the economic standpoint to be a liability for the Japanese Empire. There is a interesting paper on the matter here below:

*Michael Smitka (article by Nakagane Katsuji): The Interwar Economy of Japan: Colonialism, Depression and Recovery 1910-1940. (pages 96-97) Vol. 2. Garland Publishing 1998.

Although it has been stated that the economic ocuppation in Manchuria was an organized plunder the area suffered a trade deficit during all the Japanese occupation, deficit that was balanced by injected Japanese capital. The production was not big (some pig iron, some coal and a trickle of shale oil) Thus in 1941 Manchuria only exported 1 mill. ton of coal which was roughly 2% of the Japanese needs and 5% of iron.