Review | Massacre in Manila: the forgotten second world war battle that destroyed a city and countless lives
- Unlike the Rape of Nanking, the appalling atrocities perpetrated on civilians by Manila’s Japanese defenders have been largely forgotten – until now
- This groundbreaking history mines war crimes records, military reports and other sources to reveals the full horror of the Battle of Manila
Rampage: MacArthur, Yamashita, and the Battle of Manila by James M. Scott, pub. W.W. Norton
4 stars
It’s hard to imagine that a major month-long battle during the second world war – one that devastated a large city, caused more than 100,000 civilian deaths and led to both a historic war crimes trial and a United States Supreme Court verdict – should have escaped scrutiny until now.
But history has somehow overlooked the catastrophic battle for Manila, capital of the Philippines, in the waning months of the war. Like the Rape of Nanking, or the siege of Stalingrad, the tragedy of Manila deserves far greater understanding and reflection today.
James M. Scott fills that gap with Rampage: MacArthur, Yamashita, and the Battle of Manila, the first comprehensive account of one of the darkest chapters of the war in the Pacific. It is powerful narrative history, one almost too painful to read in places but impossible to put down.