War with Japan marked China and remade the world

Someone who wishes Shinzo Abe, Japan and Asia well should buy the Japanese prime minister a copy of Rana Mitter's new book, China's war with Japan, 1937-1945: The struggle for survival.

Let Abe read and understand the dreadful damage Imperial Japan did to China before he tries to cash in on what promises to be a sweeping upper house election victory in three weeks. With such a victory, Abe would have a majority in both houses of parliament and be able to change Japan's constitution and fulfil his promises of restoring the country's "greatness".

Abe's promise that "Japan is back" is misplaced in the modern world where we are all dependent on one another. It is especially dangerous when Abe in effect tries to wave red flags in front of a resurging China.

The same well-wisher could also supply copies to China's leaders so they, too, can understand the roles of Japan, Chiang Kai-shek and his Kuomintang, and indeed the Americans and other Western allies, in shaping China and the modern world.

For Mitter, a professor of the history and politics of modern China at Oxford University, the second world war began not in 1939 but in 1937 with the Marco Polo Bridge incident, when Japan thrust aside all pretence and went to war with China.

According to this account, modern China was not the creation of Britain and the opium wars of the 19th century, but was forged on the bloody anvil of battle against Japan.

Mitter generally handles the swirling cast of characters superbly, introducing key players like Wang Jingwei, long forgotten by Western historians who have dominated the debate on the war and thus underplayed Asia's tragic role.