A Holiday Stuck Inside: Learn Why and Stream Frank Capra's 'The Battle of China'

With the ever-expanding list of restrictions being enforced on the 99.999 percent of Beijing residents not lucky (or important) enough to be part of the dry run of China's big military parade taking place Saturday, we thought: why not stay inside like the good patriot you are and learn about the event worthy of such revelry.

The Battle of China (1944, stream on YouTube here) was Frank Capra’s sixth and penultimate documentary in his film series Why We Fight, commissioned by the US government as part of their propaganda push to unite the allies and legitimize their actions abroad (fun fact: all the animation and maps in the films were created at Disney Studios).

In Capra’s words, the film portrays how “Japan's warlords commit total effort to conquest of China. Once conquered, Japan would use China's manpower for the conquest of all Asia.”

The film largely documents the major events of Chiang Kai Shek and the Nationalists battling against the encroaching Japanese armies, setting the scene for their eventual defeat on September 2, 1945.

It also features some pretty great stock footage from around China and does its best to remain objective (from a typically America-centric POV), sometimes allowing its propaganda underpinnings come to light, for example, with constant reference to the pejorative “Japs.”

As with all modern day spectacles of Chinese mite, it is both difficult to ignore but easy to overlook the driving force of this country; from the young soldiers sitting firmly in their tanks rolling down Chang’an Lu to their families glued to the TV at home, watching in awe, we’d do well to remember that, as the film states throughout: “China is history, China is land, but most important, China is people.” Now would be a good time to acknowledge why what is happening is unfolding before us and as much as it isn’t about the little man, what it means for them.

If movies are not your thing, then why not spend your holiday devouring Forgotten Ally: China's World War II, 1937-1945, Oxford historian Rana Mitterthe's riveting account of China’s role in World War II (available on Kindle if you have an overseas account here). Rarely has a western historian taken such a close and balanced look at the Japanese aggression in China during WWII and this book serves as the perfect primer for those who are unfamiliar with this tumultuous time prior to the founding of the People’s Republic, while also remaining breathtaking even for those more knowledgeable with the period.

No matter how you decide to spend your anti-fascist holiday, it would be wise to learn a little more about why we're all stuck inside, and the government has handily created the perfect (if not wholly inconvenient) excuse to do so.

More stories by this author here.

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