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The Second Sino-Japanese War (July 7, 1937 – September 9, 1945) was a military conflict fought primarily between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan. After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the war merged into the greater conflict of World War II as a major front of what is broadly known as the Pacific War.<br/><br/> Although the two countries had fought intermittently since 1931, total war started in earnest in 1937 and ended only with the surrender of Japan in 1945. The war was the result of a decades-long Japanese imperialist policy aiming to dominate China politically and militarily and to secure its vast raw material reserves and other economic resources, particularly food and labour. Before 1937, China and Japan fought in small, localized engagements.<br/><br/> Yet the two sides, for a variety of reasons, refrained from fighting a total war. In 1931, the Japanese invasion of Manchuria by Japan's Kwantung Army followed the Mukden Incident. The last of these incidents was the Marco Polo Bridge Incident of 1937, marking the beginning of total war between the two countries.
Illustration by the Austrian artist Friedrich Schiff, who lived in Shanghai during the 1930s and 1940s. His images exemplify the 'anything goes' atmosphere and indulgence amidst poverty that characterised Old Shanghai and which would soon be brought to an abrupt end by Japanese invasion (1937) and Communist revolution (1949).
The innocuously named Studies and Observations Group (SOG) was a secret American military unit of elite troops best known for covert operations behind enemy lines such as surveillance, hit-and-run, search and rescue, sabotage, snatching prisoners, and setting booby traps. Its Psychological Operations Group was responsible for 'black' propaganda. The aim was to irritate Hanoi, persuade the authorities that security on the home front was being undermined, and divert resounces into searching out and countering the perceived threats.<br/><br/> One of its projects was to 'set up' dissident groups in North Vietnam claiming to be truly patriotic but spreading dissent and rumours about the conduct of the war and, especially, the Country’s Chinese ally. One such group was the anti-Communist 'Sacred Sword of the Patriots League' (SSPL). These groups did not exist but by spreading paperwork to and from non-existent agents and officials, supported by phoney radio transmissions, enemy counter-intelligence might be persuaded that they did.<br/><br/> 'Patriotic League' leaflets were planted by SOG personnel on North Vietnamese roads and trails where they would be found and handed in. They were also air-dropped, usually at night, by unmarked planes. They read as if written by North Vietnamese patriots whose aim was not to overthrow but to influence the Party and the Government, and to achieve true independence for Vietnam and not another period of colonial rule by the Chinese. In addition they claimed to echo the concerns of ordinary people.<br/><br/> Two examples are the food shortages created as agricultural produce was diverted to buy arms for the war, and inadequate financial support for students.
Adverisement for Pachod Freres d'Indochine - Saigon, Hanoi, Haiphong. Saigon, and especially Rue Catinat, was known for its parfumeries.
The Arc-en-Ciel was arguably Saigon's top night spot during the 1940s and 1950s. Located in Saigon's twin city of Cholon on Jaccareo Avenue - today's Tan Da - it features prominently in Graham Greene's 'The Quiet American' as the taxi dance venue where Thomas Fowler met and wooed Phuong.
The Peace Hotel (Chinese: 和平饭店) is a hotel on The Bund in Shanghai, China which overlooks the Huangpu River. The hotel today operates as two separate businesses. The North Building, built as Sassoon House, originally housed the Cathay Hotel and is today the Fairmont Peace Hotel run by Fairmont Hotels and Resorts of Canada.<br/><br/> In 1930, the Shanghai Metropole Hotel, built by Mr. Saxon, Chairman of the Jewish Confederation, topped the European style buildings with its Baroque tower. Shanghai Metropole Hotel neighbors the Bund on the East, the Yu Garden on the south, the People's Square on the West, and the Walking Street of Nanjing Road on the north.